In the Heart of the Garden

by Leah Fleming

  If Micah felt relief or sadness to be so close to home he would not be showing it before his men. He feared to reveal any weakness, had seen it betray other men into folly and death. Those who lingered over their actions or examined their motives too deeply soon came to grief. It was as if they were fighting the battle from both sides and exhausted themselves with the effort to remain humane and generous. Such emotions did not sit well beneath a helmet.

  There were no gun carts to hold back their progress in the rutted lanes but the heat was getting to all the men in their thick buff coats and black breast plates which roasted them in such a heat. Micah could feel his own shift crawling with lice. They had been living from the saddle for a week, sleeping rough in tinder-dry bracken beds, searching out water from the trickles in the stream beds. It was little things like this that discomfited him most for he was a fastidious man by nature and longed to dunk himself in the fish pond below, feel the cool water washing away his weariness and filth.

  It had been hard at first to leave a soft bed and lodge upon the cold earth, to give up choice meats for a little coarse bread and hard cheese, with only brackish water to drink and a foul pipe of tobacco to suck on. It was hard to leave Mother to her constant worrying, his childhood friends and the scholars in exchange for the whistle of bullets and bodies dropping dead at his feet. He was sick of that music. Given time one got used to being lousy and hungry, saddle sore and unwelcome. Yet, oh, to be so close to home! This would be a temptation but in such a summer of plague and sickness, he could not risk his men by moving further in towards the dirty streets and filth of a town. Let the Malignants suffer such for their sins. He would keep cool and clean up here at Fridewell.

  He slitted his eyes to get a better view of the village nestled against the side of the slope. They would put up no resistance, not with kinfolk to protect. There would be no one of any consequence down there to co-ordinate an insurrection. There’d be an old widow no doubt, for both the Salt brothers were slain at Edgehill. He had seen their bodies laid out with all the other Midland men and marked their standard in the bunch of ragged colours captured on that day. No, there would be no resistance, but just in case it would give him great satisfaction to soften them up; a little scaremongering, a little throwing of Bagshott weight about the place should do the trick.

  The Captain stabbed his finger down towards the red brick house which stood proudly on its own, set apart from the other village dwellings, bordered with green turf and knot beds, shrubs and sturdy outbuildings, upright and prosperous-looking in the glinting sunshine.

  ‘Shift yourselves down there. Turn it over… search for any silver, arms, treasure. And leave no stone unturned. I do not trust these folk. Search the usual places – ponds, gardens – and see where the soil is fresh turned over. Rose beds have yielded many a fine piece of silver plate. Go to it but do not sack the house. We shall rest up there in comfort, lads, guarding the lanes from the enemy abroad. Yes, we shall let Fridewell’s golden fields feed us and our horses for a while.

  ‘Now, hurry about your business! It’ll give me great pleasure to see the Salt riches spilled o’er the ground.’

  *

  A woman in a black gown trimmed with a collar of white lace paced anxiously over the terrace, back and forth, back and forth. She stopped to examine the rose bushes. The leaves were sparse, dappled yellow and brown, the foliage thin, and the June show long past. If she had dead headed more carefully there would have been a second flush to admire. But who was there to see?

  The earth was parched. Even the weeds were wilting in the fierce glare of sunlight. She had never cared much for the knot beds with their stiff plantings dotted here and there between the box. The formal patterns had long been neglected and stray meadow flowers were creeping back from the fields beyond to reclaim the space. If only she had the heart to see to the garden chores, but her spirit was too downtrodden by the war to make any effort with ‘my lady’s garden’.

  It was too hot to be wearing black, too hot for thick petticoats and ruffles, but she had no mind for colour. These sickly blooms were colour enough, only their scent soothed the ache in her soul. Why did you go? Oh, Beavis… leaving us alone and unprotected. How can I forgive you for being so strong-willed, choosing to leave this blessed plot and your heart’s home and abandon us to the mercy of fortune? For three summers I waited for your return. How can you be dead when I never saw your body? Oh, Beavis, how will I survive this affliction? It is not to be borne.

  Nazareth Salt felt the hot tears sting her cheeks. She looked once again at her husband’s garden. Once she had come here as a young bride, full of hope, dressed in pale blue silk brocade edged with fine lace in the latest fashion, a bridal gift from her mother. How slender was her waist then and how full her bosom, her hair lovingly glossed with a tincture of rosemary. She had none of the usual Sapcote plainness, being only distant kin to them. Not like her own poor child, Lucilla. A perfect English rose she had been once, now a blasted bloom with her widow’s weeds and suntanned complexion. She could scarce be bothered to wear a cap.

  Benjamin and Elizabeth Salt had nodded with approval at their son’s choice but the stern old ancient in her ninetieth year, Old Sarah, had prodded the girl Nazareth with her stick like a sapling oak under inspection. ‘My lady’s garden’ was Old Sarah’s joy and none of Nazareth’s choosing. Beavis had taken such pride in the house and it was not hard to love its sturdy brick walls and tranquil air. Yet she was never able to take to the formal terrace. It was a showplace, too formal, too redolent of Old Sarah’s presence, turned as it was southward and westward to catch the slope of the land, showing off the knot beds and roses. Hidden beside the older part of the house was a walled hedge and a quiet patch, much neglected, close to the spring from which the house took its name. It was a sorry sight now, partially blocked with fallen masonry, weeds choking the banks of the stream. This source and fount of their very lives lay neglected, ignored in favour of a fancy sundial and a regimented row of rose bushes.

  It was to here that Nazareth turned, directing her efforts to restoring the wellspring and old hedged garden. Here she felt peacefully secluded, safe at the heart of things. To her surprise she found she had a way with plantings, a softness of touch, a feel for the red earth and the heart of the soil, instinctively knowing when to sow and when to wait. Patience was a gift with which she was well endowed. For three summers, while she was waiting for Beavis to return home, this part of the garden had become her refuge when sleep would not come. Now her patience, like the stream, was drying up.

  Nazareth yearned for someone strong to take the burden of responsibility from her shoulders. She was sick of making decisions, dealing with the estate and the field men. Her own kin were far away and it was dangerous to travel. Blewart’s widow, Letty, had her own troubles and young children to raise at Longhall. She had remarried a kind soldier with one arm and was soon to bear another child to him. A new life was beginning for her. Letty did not have a daughter who refused to accept that her father would not be coming home but nursed forlorn hope like a lantern in a dark night.

  If only Lucilla would be her mother’s little companion and share the joys of the hidden garden. Why would she not chase the butterflies and bash down the bushes like the children at Longhall Manor, who raced around the gardens like playful puppies when they came to visit? Lucie stayed indoors instead and sewed, looking down with disapproval at their antics.

  *

  The child was watching now through the mullioned windows at the top of the stair. Nothing was missed, not the glint of metal flashing on the ridge or the line of soldiers with their banner flying high. Their sashes were bright orange not pink. Strangers in the village again, soldiers of the other side, not attired like Father in lace cuffs and feathers. She could still see him in his thigh boots, bright breast plate and shining helmet. She had raced eagerly to the gate to wave him on his way, so small in stature then that she’d had to look up into the sky when he was on horseback.
Now she took no interest in horses or armour. Only when Father returned would she step outside the door to jump into his arms.

  Lucilla watched her mother pacing about as usual in the rose bed like a witch in her black garb. Why did she wear widow’s weeds when she knew Father would come home at the end of the war, returning to watch over them again? The child hated to see her in that hideous flat cap with her ringlets tossing about like a milkmaid’s. Indeed, Mother no longer behaved like a lady. Father would be displeased that she had let herself go so thoroughly. Everything was topsy-turvy since he’d left them. Lucilla could not fathom out the reasoning of her elders. You were for King or Parliament, pink or orange, Protestant or Papist, rebel or recusant. She knew all the words by rote but what did they mean? Could they not sit down and talk together or hold their hands up and say ‘barley’, making a truce? Why did they have to end up quarrelling and fighting like her stupid cousins, Richard and Tobias?

  Lucie liked to sit at the top of the stairs and watch life going on through the window. It was well placed between the old dark chamber and the new house. Here she was safe and cool with no wasps to sting her or creepy crawlies under her skirts. This was Lucilla’s Kingdom and she was the Queen of the stairs; no one could pass by inside or out but she had knowledge of it. No one bothered how she amused herself as long as she had something in her hands, a Bible pamphlet or chap book, a piece of sewing, her pretty wooden doll. Mother scarce noticed her as she went hither and thither like a servant about her tasks. Martha carried up the clean linen into the press and she loved to sniff within the dry place where lavender balls and tansy were strewn.

  Soon it would be her favourite hour when the sunlight shafted through the leaden window panes like a golden fan onto the dark oak staircase with their initials carved deeply into the wood. The beams fell on the portait of ‘Old Sarah’ who rebuilt the New House and ‘My lady’s garden’, always to be said in one breath. Old Sarah went with the house like the bricks and mortar, Mother would sneer. Martha Barnsley said the dame was a fearsome woman and strong willed and that Miss Lucilla had that same cleft chin and steel eye for detail. The child wondered what Old Sarah would make of all this terrible turnabout. Perhaps she would have taken up a pike or cudgel and beat these strangers out of the village with her bare hands.

  There had been letters from Mother’s kin, brought on horseback from the city, which had made her cry. She had retreated into the garden to savour their news, reading the sheets over and over again until they were worn thin. The news for the King’s Cause was never good.

  Lucie would stand in the doorway, pulling the door stop back and forth until she had once noticed that it bore a faint picture engraved into the surface: a lady with a child on her knee and some inscription too worn by the years to decipher. Martha the maid could make nothing of it but Mother, puzzled and intrigued by its weight and shape, took it upon herself to show it to Reverend Masterson, who got all flushed in the cheeks, saying it was an old seal, perhaps the lost seal of Saint Mary’s Priory, founded centuries ago by one of their forebears. It was he who suggested that it was the Virgin and Holy Child depicted, and advised that such an effigy was best hidden away in these troublesome times. But he’d fingered it lovingly for all that. Mother said it must be kept safe from view or they would be taken for Papists, and found another weight for the old door.

  Lucilla was vexed at such a fuss and pleaded to hide it in her own chamber in her treasure box, inlaid with mother-of-pearl initials. Finders should be keepers, she argued, and for once Mother had agreed.

  It was so heavy it fell to the bottom of the wooden box along with the precious letter, the only reminder of Father she had left to herself. Lucie knew every word of his note by heart: ‘Greetings to Lucilla, my own trew Little Light. Be good to your dear mother and keep her safe until I return.’ She also had a piece of fancy ribbon from his best jacket and the little phial of Hungary water which was passed down to all the ladies in the family as a relic or something like that. There was a feather fan too which Father said was made from the wings of fairies. With such a box of treasures, and such delights therein, who needed to go out of doors?

  Lucilla glanced upwards again to the top of the lane. The soldiers on horseback were riding fast, galloping down in the direction of the house. Lucie knew they were not the King’s men. They wore strange helmets like masks and their ripped banner streamed in the breeze as they stormed through the gate and into the cobbled entrance yard.

  The child fled to her chamber, hiding under the counterpane, clutching her treasures tightly to her chest. Perhaps if she lay quiet they would all go away.

  *

  At the sound of clattering hooves the mistress and her servants made for the courtyard. Nazareth tried to stay calm as she undid the knot of her apron, smoothed her hair back from her sticky face and beckoned to Martha and Gideon to walk behind her.

  ‘For King or Parliament?’ shouted a Sergeant roughly.

  ‘We are for ourselves… as you see, there is only a boy to defend us here.’ Nazareth stood as tall and straight as she could, looking the man straight in the eye.

  ‘Those who are not for us are agin us, mistress.’

  ‘Whatever you say, sire, but there is nothing here to take your interest. No arms, horses or cattle left. The last visitors saw to that.’

  ‘Then we must check there was no oversight. Stand aside! See to the usual places, men, and search it well. Necessity makes liars of ladies and beggars alike.’ He laughed down at her, pushing past to dismount and order the troopers into the store barn and then the garden. Nazareth followed quickly behind, running to keep up with their progress. ‘This is my house, sire!’

  ‘Then hinder us not and ’twill come to no harm. Impede us further and it will be torched. That’s right… search the garden!’ He waved his arms in the direction of the rose knot.

  ‘What could be hidden in a bunch of rose bushes?’ Nazareth screamed after him.

  ‘Ah, madam, you would be surprised what Popish trinkets find their way into such roots.’ He was laughing at her helplessness. She watched them push over the sundial. It splintered and fell in pieces. They hacked at the roses, scooped up the soil, shaking their heads with disappointment. ‘Oh, sire, I beseech you, this is an ancient and holy dwelling. See, the church has already been ransacked. Not a window is saved and the bell tower has fallen. Tell us what you require and we will see to it.’

  She was pleading now, afraid of the glint in the Sergeant’s eye which was cruel and cold. He cared not a jot for her feelings. His men were busily pulling out all the tools from the barn, the wheelbarrow and forks, the bales of straw, tossing them around the yard. The Sergeant was angry at this and sent them to search down the well.

  ‘There’s no well here, only an everlasting spring to the rear… you are welcome to share our fresh water for your horses look tired.’

  Nazareth was ignored as they stormed towards the buttery door where the last of the ham was hanging and the jars of fruits. ‘This is more to our liking.’ A trooper lifted a crock and smashed it on the stone flags. ‘Oh, dearie me!’

  Nazareth felt such a blaze of anger rise within her that it overwhelmed all other fears. ‘How dare you spoil precious food when we have all fasted like nuns for weeks to preserve this for winter? Sergeant, keep your men under control… they are like ravening wolves! I demand to speak to your commander. This indignity is not to be borne. It is not a Christian act…’

  ‘No more! Halt. Harken to the lady’s bidding,’ the Captain ordered as he rode slowly into the yard. He held up his hand in salute. ‘That’s enough, Sergeant. Don’t destroy what must support us.’

  Nazareth recognised the orange sash of an officer of the Cavalry. She could not see his face for the sun was in her eyes, merely a broad and towering presence casting a long shadow. She shaded her eyes to see what manner of man greeted her but all she could make out behind the visor was the face of a dark man, dusty and lined.

  ‘Why have you
r men seen fit to raze my garden and raid my stores? Asked civilly we would have shared what little we have left. You see, we live like peasants. I have but a maid and boy to serve us. This is not the act of gentlemen, sire.’ Her voice trembled with rage but her legs quivered.

  ‘Madam, I apologise if they have been overzealous in their industry. I see but a few upturned roses and will have them replanted forthwith.’

  ‘Save your breath, sire. I care not for those beds nor ever have. Let them continue with their rout so that I may plant a better crop of flowers and herbs. But the sundial is smashed. It was a particular favourite of my dear late husband and goes back many generations.’

  ‘Aye, to old Sarah Salte who built this house, if I am not mistaken?’

  ‘How come you have knowledge of us, sire? We are but farmers whose fortunes are now laid low for all to see.’

  ‘I am Captain Micah Bagshott of the Company of Cavalry, late of the city. I know full well the fortunes of this house and how its vanity brought great misfortune on my own kin in these parts.’

  ‘This was none of my doing, being related by marriage only and lately widowed. I know nothing of such stories but your name is familiar to me.’

  ‘So it should be! Bagshotts were ever at the tender mercies of Saltes in times past. Now Almighty God is redressing the balance at long last.’

  He was laughing as he dismounted and took off his helmet, shaking free a mop of greasy curls which reached his shoulders. He towered over her like a huge black bear, broad-shouldered, rough-hewn. His dusty thigh boots reached almost level with her waist. His face was lean and strong, clean-shaven, and his confident manner was disarming in its simplicity. If he were indeed a true Bagshott then he was much improved in station and speech on the peasants who lived scattered around Longhall. He was almost a gentleman. Nazareth drank him in with grim satisfaction. Would he be gentleman enough to protect her honour from pillage and shame?