The Secret Diary of Kitty Cask, Smuggler's Daughter

by Philip Ardagh

  With surprise on their side – the informant who’d told them of what to look for at The Black Eye must also have told them of the existence of the cave and where to find its hidden entrance – and with far more redcoats than ever seen in Minnock at one time, we were outmanoeuvred and outnumbered.

  But, when my father cried, “Withdraw!” we did have one thing to our advantage. The freetraders know this cove by night better than any redcoat and they melted away into the darkness, except for two wounded. And my father.

  One of these was Flint – Tom Tregowan – who’d been hit in the leg by rifle shot and was half-lying, half-sitting upon the sand, back propped against a rock, just ahead of me.

  A redcoat started running towards him with his rifle out in front of him, bayonet fixed. I had to do something. But what? I fumbled for a stone and threw it wildly at the soldier, hitting him on the head. He turned around in rage and must have dimly made out my figure in the darkness.

  As he ignored Tom Tregowan and charged at me, I slipped and fell, only to feel myself being scooped up in a large man’s hand.

  “Put–” I began, then felt another hand being clamped across my mouth.

  “Sshh, Limpet,” whispered a voice, and I recognised it at once as belonging to my father. A moment later, it was followed by his giving out a shuddering cry as, I later realised, the bayonet caught his side from behind. But he did not drop me, and he ran.

  “Captain! Are you all right?” cried Tom.

  “Save yourself!” shouted my father.

  Back home, I knew that I would have much explaining to do, but first things first, we needed to tend to my father’s wound. Once a safe distance from the cove, he’d put me back down upon my own two feet and we had run abreast. By the time we neared the cottage, I was supporting him as he held his side.

  Eliza tore a bed sheet into strips while I got a bowl of water and Sovereign licked my father’s face, which may not have pleased him but was, at least, a distraction.

  “You’ll live,” said Eliza when the wound was washed and dressed. “A tougher man might call it a mere scratch.” From the amount of blood in the bowl and on the rags, I knew her to be teasing and he took it in good faith.

  “And if you were a better nurse this scratch might not kill me!” he replied, with a grin.

  Sitting quietly by the fire, a warm brandy in his belly, he now turned his attention to me. The moment I had been dreading.

  “Do you think I don’t know you follow me some nights?” he asked. “Who would be worthy to lead his men if he didn’t spot his own daughter ducking behind a milestone here or a hedge there?”

  “You knew?” I asked in genuine surprise.

  “Of course I knew.”

  “Then why didn’t you stop me?”

  “I’ve told you many times of the dangers, Kitty,” he said. “I’ve as much as ordered you never to risk your own life or others.”

  “Others?”

  “Do you think I’d turn my back on a bayonet for anyone but you or your little sister? Do you think I’d have left Tom to fend for himself when I could have helped him?”

  I burst into tears and flung my arms around him. Feeling him flinch in pain, I hurriedly let go. “Oh, father, I’m so sorry…”

  “No time for snivelling, Kit,” he said.

  “But if you knew, why did you never confront me or shout at me or lock me in my room or beat me with a belt?”

  My father laughed. “And if I had confronted you or shouted at you or locked you in a room or beaten you with a belt, would you still have followed us on our night time journeys?”

  “Yes,” I said without a moment’s hesitation.

  “Then there’s your answer. You are your mother’s daughter, fierce and independent. I can ask you to be wise and sensible, but I cannot make you, Kitty. You are who you are. Half Cask and half Treppen. Now, away to bed with you.”

  Sovereign slept on my bed that night, but I could not sleep for fear that Tom Tregowan might have been run-through with a redcoat’s bayonet. And it was my fault.

  I must have finally drifted off, however, for I was awoken by the creak of my bedroom door opening. It was Jago!

  “Father asked me to tell you that all is well,” he said, in the shadow of my candle, still burning at my bedside.

  “Tom Tregowan?” I asked, sitting upright.

  “Not a single man left behind on the beach,” he said. “A disappointing night for Duggan, I imagine!”

  “But how?” I asked.

  “I’m a one-man army, me,” he said. “And strong enough to carry two wounded men without so much as breaking a sweat.” I could hear the smile in his voice.

  I pummelled his chest with my fists. “You’re just a strutting peacock!” I said, giving him a hug. He smelt of saltwater, brandy and gunpowder. Then a thought occurred to me. “What of the lookouts? They must have been caught before being able to give warning.”

  “The detail of redcoats later marching them to jail were met by a mob,” he said, “who persuaded them to let the men go. And I think you’ll find our very own Eliza was amongst them! Now, don’t waste any more of your candle, and go to sleep,” said my brother.

  I nodded but, when he’d gone, I slipped out of bed and – with a much happier heart – wrote this entry in my diary.

  ____________

  83 There are a number of Cornish myths about selkies; seals who can take on human form and live amongst people – forced to stay that way if people hide their skin – but, once in their skin, they become seals once more and go back to the sea.

  84 Customs men, excisemen, constables and soldiers. In other words, just about anyone out to prevent (stop) the smuggling.

  85 There are even instances of church crypts being used to store smuggled goods, in full knowledge of the clergyman!

  86 The phrase ‘caught red-handed’ dates back to the fifteenth century, and the red probably refers to the blood of a murder victim, or to the blood of a poached animal.

  87 The phrase ‘a flash in the pan’, referring to a brief success that’s not followed up, comes from flintlock pistols. If there’s a flash in the pan, it’s not followed up with the successful firing of shot.

  88 In this case, the coast was literally – or seemingly – clear of unwanted guests: the redcoats. The phrase, however, has come to mean that it’s safe to proceed because there’s no one watching or listening.

  89 The rather modern-sounding word ‘goody’ dates back to 1754 and refers to something tasty! 1765 saw the publication of a nursery tale called The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes, about a girl who had one shoe… until the end!

  90 West Country skittles was a popular pastime behind inns/ale houses/pubs. They are still played today, and a number of pubs – especially in Somerset and Dorset – have rooms containing skittle alleys.

  91 Barrel.

  92 A blade fixed at the end of a rifle.

  Father and one other have been arrested!

  The soldiers came at dawn and, though Sovereign gave warning, it was not soon enough. The front door, not locked, burst open, and a dozen redcoats spilled in. By the time I had jumped from my bed and begun running down the stairs, Father was already struggling under the weight of five or six soldiers, manhandling him to the door.

  “Why are you putting up such a fight if you have nothing to hide, Cask?” demanded Sergeant Byron.

  “Being innocent hasn’t been reason enough for you not to clap others in irons93,” my father bellowed, keeping up the struggle.

  My Uncle Jonah once told me that you should judge a man not by how he fights when he’s winning but when he knows he’s going to lose. And father showed no sign of giving up the struggle.

  The sergeant strode forward and pulled up my father’s shirt, revealing the dressed bayonet-wound. With triumph in his eyes, he looked at my father. “We meet at last, Captain,” he said, almost spitting out the name my father uses by night.

  “Captain?” said my father, still struggling. �
��I don’t know what you mean by that, sergeant, but if a captain I be, I outrank you!” With that, he aimed a swift kick at Byron, the tip of his boot missing the sergeant’s shin by a fraction.

  Byron stepped back. “You’ll be put before the magistrate and a jury of your peers and all will be fair and above board, Cask!” Sergeant Byron insisted. “Justice will be seen to be done! But, with all that contraband stored in the cave at Hangman’s Cove, we’ll have enough evidence against you to see you hang.”

  “Justice?” cried Eliza from the open front doorway. “What do you know about Justice? The King’s Men, indeed. You’re a disgrace to the uniform, the lot of you! I’ve heard tell of your wild nights of drinking in Fowle and of your –”

  “Enough, Eliza,” said my father, looking her in the eye. The soldier had managed to get my father’s hands behind his back and was forcing him to bend forwards.

  But Eliza was not done. She went up to the redcoat grasping my father’s wrist and began hitting him on the back, again and again. Hard. “Don’t you try to be avoiding my gaze, Tobias Smart, you Jack of Legs94!” she said. “I knew you when you didn’t have so much as a sleeve to wipe your snot-nose on, and no fancy uniform is going to change that. I reckon you only took the shilling95 to be sure to get some clothes to fit! How does your ma feel about you raising your hand against good, honest seafaring folk, what with your own father – God rest his soul – having died a fisherman at sea?”

  “Enough, you old bagpipe96,” said Byron, and went to hit her with the butt of the rifle slung about his neck97.

  No sooner was the rifle raised than both myself and Sovereign launched ourselves to dear Eliza’s defence: me from the stairs and Sovereign from the hearth. Both of us snarled: he in Cornish-Dog and me in English. Father can look after himself, but my dear Eliza?

  The rifle butt intended for Eliza now came into contact with Sovereign’s jaw.

  I went wild and off the hooks.98

  Which is how I became the one other arrested with my father and carted off to Fowle.

  I’ll bet news has spread quicker than the pox99 and that no-one in Minnock is talking of anything else.

  God knows how many days we’ve been in this stinking jail cell and He’s not telling. James Treppen has been to visit and says that Sovereign is fine. The Reverend Glass is on speaking terms with the witch who lives all on her ownsome between Minnock and Cartsbay. She is an animal healer and has, so Master James tells it, made a poultice from herbs and a special concoction to mend poor Sovereign’s jaw.

  “She says it’d heal quicker if it were summer and she could use fresh herbs,” James Treppen explained, “but that dried herbs will do just as well over time.” He then added, as an afterthought, that she’s also been looking after Tom Tregowan’s leg and some other fellow who’d hurt his head.

  “Please thank the Reverend and the witch,” I said.

  We were calling to each other through a smaller barred window near the top of the door, but neither of us was tall enough to look through it and see the other.

  “Reverend Glass says she’s not a witch but a healer,” said James. “That she could probably be a doctor if women were allowed to be doctors.”100

  I gave a mirthless laugh, not at the thought of a woman having the skills to be a doctor but the likelihood of men ever letting a woman be one.

  James hadn’t only brought news of Sovereign’s treatment, but also food, for which we were most grateful.

  I say ‘we’ for I am sharing this cell with my father. I could not have survived without him. Though to many in Fowle he is just another fisherman from the nearby village of Minnock, here in the jailhouse, he is not without friends. They have brought us blankets – for it’s very cold at night in here without a fire – and even a full bottle of rum found its way to my father’s lips. But the food is bread, bread and yet more bread, each piece more stale than the last.

  James brought us rough-cut slices of cooked meats, which he reached up and stuck through the bars. Just the smell on my fingers from touching it was delicious, so I licked them before tearing off pieces of meat and putting them in my mouth, savouring each mouthful. He also brought paper, ink and quill to write with – they are what I’m using now – and a message for my father from Uncle Jonah.

  It was not writ on paper but passed from Uncle Jonah’s lips to James Treppen’s lips to my father’s ear. It was a single word: Palores.

  ____________

  93 Put them in chains/lock them up.

  94 Very tall person.

  95 Taking the King’s Shilling meant signing up to join the armed forces. If you could be tricked into taking the King’s shilling, you could end up being forced into the army or navy. Being forced into the navy was called being pressganged.

  96 A long-winded talker.

  97 Rifles at this time were loaded through the barrel: gunpowder (to propel the shot), and little metal balls –combining to create the shot – the actual ammunition.

  98 Crazy.

  99 A highly infectious disease.

  100 Before being a doctor was seen as a ‘proper profession’, healing was often carried out by women but, as science progressed and it gained status, women were side-lined and men became ‘proper’ doctors.

  Today, we were visited by a man dressed all in black, a red skull cap on his head. He wore the biggest gold cross – not crucifix101 – I have ever seen on a chain around anyone’s neck. He had a look of absolute peace upon his face but, when he tilted forward, it was obscured by great locks of hair as white as Cotswold lions.102 With him was a fellow clergyman, who could not have been less like him if he’d tried. Whereas the first man was all straight lines, flowing robes and neatness, the second was all sharp angles: jutting elbows and knees, with hair like an abandoned bird’s nest, left to the elements. Most unusual for a parson, he also had a beard in as much disarray as an untamed hedgerow in summer. This smaller, messy, man was clutching a battered black leather-bound Bible.

  When the jailer let them into our cell, he raised an eyebrow to my father. “Never had you down as a religious man, Jon Cask,” he said, “but the fear of the drop103 is enough to turn any man to God, I suppose.”

  “I’m as God-fearing as any man, Rod Tundy,” my father replied, “and I have every faith that I shall not hang.”

  “Then you’re more of an ass than the law itself!104” said the jailer with a chuckle. He stepped out of the cell, slamming the thick wooden door behind him, and there was a jangle of keys as he locked us all in. “Call me when you’re ready, Father.”

  No sooner had Rod Tundy’s footsteps faded down the flag-stoned corridor, than my father threw his arms around the black-robed Reverend, who hugged him back. It was then I noticed the tip of an anchor tattoo upon his wrist, sticking out beneath his cuff.

  I knew then all was not what it seemed, for I’ve never seen black-cattle105 with a tattoo!

  A moment later, off came the golden cross and chain, the hat and the wig and, there before me, stood a redcoat… at least, the man was dressed in the King’s men uniform.

  I was aghast. What did all this mean?

  Before I had time to think more of it, my father said, “Get dressed, Kitty,” and I saw the second man – a lad – had also slipped from his disguise. He was dressed like one of the boys who ran messages for the soldiers for the odd farthing.106

  “Good to see you, Silas,” said my father to the ‘redcoat’.

  “This is my boy, Christopher,” said the man.

  My father smiled and nodded in his direction. “And may St Christopher protect us on our journey out of here, for, though few in steps, it’s as fraught in as many dangers as the roughest sea.”107

  The black robe, wig and red-cap fitted Father perfectly, and the smaller so-called parson’s clothes were an excellent fit for me. My father tilted his head forward and the wig obscured his features and, anyway, all eyes would be on that enormous golden cross.

  “Practise the walk, all elbows and knees
,” my father instructed, which I did across the cell floor with such success that he grinned with glee. “First time, my splendid Kitty!” he said.

  With my bird’s-nest ‘hair’ and ‘beard’, clutching the leather-bound Bible and walking the angular walk, I couldn’t have looked less like Kitty Cask if I tried.

  “What now?” I whispered.

  “We bid farewell to this Godforsaken place!”

  With that, Silas, the so-called priest now dressed as a so-called soldier, called out to Rod Tundy in his most priestly tone, “Guard? Guard?”

  We heard a grunt and shuffle and a jangling of keys getting nearer and nearer as the jailer padded down the corridor. “Coming, Reverend!” he called. I then heard him distinctly mutter. “Guard? Guard? I ain’t no guard me, I’m chief jailer…”

  He peered through the small barred window in the cell door and saw me and father in our religious disguises. Silas and his boy Christopher were flat against the wall that shared the doorway, keeping out of sight. There was the sound of the key in the lock, more jangling of keys, and the cell door opened. He stepped inside then stepped aside to less us pass, which is when Silas knocked him unconscious from behind. As quick as a flash, he and Christopher dragged the sleeping jailer to a corner. The lad took some sturdy string from his pocket and, before he could say, “Help me!” they had him trussed up like a Christmas goose.108

  “Ready?” asked Father, looking every bit the clergyman.

  “One moment,” said Silas, reaching up into the back of his jacket. He pulled out a redcoat’s hat and placed it on his head. “Ready,” he said.