Pistoleer: Brentford

by Smith, Skye

  Skippon took a good look around and then told Ashfield. "Right here is as good a place as any. At least this mound will let us see all of the regiments. Have them line up north-south and make it a long line so that Rupert's cavalryers will have a hard time flanking us." Ashfield rode back the slope and began giving orders to the other officers. A squad of infantry was brought up to the front and were the first to turn off the road to the north. Their task would open the walls and hedges just enough so the officers would not have to jump their horses as they rode north to mark the line.

  "John, your men must be exhausted," Skippon told Hampden. "The real army is here now, and we will replace any of your militia units that were fighting yesterday. Please lead them away from the highway and river up to the far north point of our line. That should be the safest place for them, the place least likely to see action. All you need do during the battle is stand them up and make our line look longer than it is. That will force the king to stretch his lines thinner."

  Hampden couldn't argue with the logic. Holles's Redcoats had been ripped to pieces and there were damn few of them fit to walk, never mind fight. Greville's Purplejackets had survived intact but were exhausted from standing watch all night. His own Greenjackets had quick marched all the way from Uxbridge and without a rest had then attacked the king's regiments to draw Rupert away from the slaughter of the Redcoats. They deserved a rest, though he would rather they be resting as a reserve behind the front line than be forming the northern flank. This battle would be for control of the Thames and the Great West Road, and his men would be the furthest away from either.

  "Come Danny," Hampden said. "Keep me company while I pass our orders on to Greville and Holles."

  "Holles is visiting with his wounded on the barges," Daniel replied. He turned around to point and noticed that one of the barges had already slipped its moorings as was floating into the channel. "He'll stay with them until the last barge leaves. He's tearing himself apart for not being with them when they needed him the most."

  They didn't have to walk far to find Greville. In truth they didn't have to walk at all for the Lord Brooke had been climbing slowly up their rise but had stopped and turned to wave to the departing barges. When he finally reached them he was gumming a dry crust of bread, trying to soften it enough to chew it. "We fell back so fast from Brentford that we lost our food supplies to Rupert," he said in way of explanation for such a poor breakfast for a baron. "I've sent some riders into London to fetch us more."

  Hampden began explaining Skippon's lines to him, while Daniel was content to sit on the ground and open his cloak and his buff coat to whatever warmth was in the morning sun. He'd had perhaps four hours sleep in the last three days, and he desperately needed more. Laying there, he aimed his boot soles at the morning sun in hopes that it would warm the soles, and he closed his eyes. Beyond his two boots countless thousands of boots were stomping along the Great West Road and then turning right and stumbling over the broken walls of a hundred small fields. The other officers let him sleep, though the entire time he dreamt of moving armies of men.

  * * * * *

  He opened his eyes many times over the next few hours, but for the life of him he couldn't keep them open. The view was mostly the same each time. Thousands of men in motion along a road. The difference was that each time he looked, the line of men was stretching longer to north across the fields. Eventually there was another difference. The one line had become two, each line stretching towards the north and separated from the other by a few hundred yards of rough ground. In his weary dreams the noises were also changing. Instead of just the sounds of men and horses, now there were also the sounds of wheels. The cannons and supplies were arriving, but he just couldn't escape his fitful sleep enough to care. That is, until he heard the sound of women's voices.

  He sat up with a start. He had never been alone on this rise, for it was one of the few points of high ground with a view all around, but before when he opened his eyes it was to see other officers doing the viewing. This time there were women. What the hell were women doing here? He decided that the question could wait and he closed his eyes again. The sun was too lovely and warm to waste on silly questions about silly women.

  A silly giggle broke through the warmth. What was the tittering voice saying? "Oh, you did not lie. He is a very pretty man. Filthy and stinking perhaps, but very pretty."

  "He always comes to me filthy and stinking," a soft voice replied. "It is his only failing, well that and already being married."

  He recognized the voice and sat bolt upright and bonked his forehead against the speakers forehead, for she had been bending down to shake him. "Britta. What are you doing here?"

  "I could ask you the same," she replied while rubbing her forehead. "You told me that you were off to ship some cannons to the Wash. Did you get confused and turn the wrong way along the Thames?"

  "We had to pick up the cannons in Kingston. We're having a bit of a problem getting them back to London. What are you doing here?"

  "Why the news is all over London," she replied. "Brentford slaughtered. Our militias slaughtered. Those that survived had no food. We brought food."

  "We?" he asked as the dizziness of the coconut bonk left him and he kneeled up and looked around. The rise was crawling with women. The great road was choked with every kind of cart and trap used in London. The smell of stew wafted around his nose and he licked his lips despite himself.

  "So is that the king's army?" Britta asked as she pointed.

  Daniel got the rest of the way up and stood beside her. For the first time in years she was not draped in silk. Before moving to London she had been an ale wench at The George in Cambridge, and the clothes she was now wearing were true to her roots. "You look wonderful love. Country clothes suit you."

  "Well I copied your trick and wore my silk nightie next to my skin to save it from the itch of the rough cloth. It must be the king's army. Look at all the fine gentlemen on their fine horses. Our lot looks quite rumpled in comparison."

  The woman with Britta came closer and purposefully stood in front of Daniel while she looked out over the scene of the two massive armies lined up and facing each other. She accidentally lost her balance and leaned back against him with her bum. Daniel recognized her as one of the Earl of Holland's daughters, despite her ale wench garb that no Rich woman would be caught dead in. The name Isabella came to mind. "Oh dear, I am sorry," she cooed as she leant back a little more so that if he looked down, he could see right down her open neckline.

  He pushed her forward so she would stop rubbing her bum against his manhood, and steadied her on her feet. "Hush now else I will lose count, eleven, twelve. The king has about twelve thousand men but many of the infantry are not troopers but the gentlemen’s' valets or the grooms for their spare horses." He began counting again. "About twelve thousand in Essex's line, but they are all fighting men. Their grooms and carters and porters are standing well back. They don't want a repeat of Edgehill."

  "What happened at Edgehill?" Britta asked.

  "Rupert's cavalryers couldn't break our infantry line, so instead they murdered all the unarmed carters and kitchen staff."

  "Which one is Rupert?" she asked. She had his Dutch looker up to her eye and was focusing it.

  "Where did you get that? I'd thought I'd lost it."

  "I borrowed it when you were staying at my house. It is perfect for keeping an eye on what is happening at Warwick House," she replied without apology. As the most delicious courtesan in London she had grown used to men giving her expensive presents, and the looker was old and worn and likely not worth much.

  He grabbed it from her. "I've been half lost all the time without it. Do you know how rare these are in England."

  His angry words shocked her. "Well how was I to know that. Besides, it had rolled under your bed so don't you be blaming me."

  He cursed himself for his angry tone. "There, over there, do you see the standard with the black falcon. The prince
is the tall man dressed all in black, even his armour." He passed the looker back to her.

  She stared through it. "But there are a half dozen tall men dressed in black."

  "They are his lifeguard. He is amongst them. Here, give it back. I need to look along our lines." He couldn't resist giving her a peck on the cheek. "Perhaps you should tell all of these women to serve up the grub they brought and then get back to London. If things go badly for Essex, you won't want to be here. The prince's flying army are not known for their politeness to women."

  "Do you really think that things will go badly for us?" she said.

  She was smiling at him as if he were the village idiot. "Not if we can hobble Rupert's flying army," he told her, and went back to staring through his looker. "Lining up across these rough fields may win the day for us."

  "So the fields will win the day and not them?" she asked while still smiling at him like he was the village idiot.

  She was pointing towards London, so he swung his looker around and looked down the Great West Road. What he saw took his breath away. There were thousands and thousands and thousands of men on the road. Men as far as he could see with his looker. Not more of the army because there were none of the bright uniforms that would mark their regiments. "Who are they?" he mumbled.

  "The lads of London," she said with glee, and took the looker from him so she could look, and then she passed it on to Isabella Rich. "They followed our luncheon traps out of London. A lot of them are Robert's men." She meant her patron Robert Rich, the Earl of Warwick. "You know, the ones he has been recruiting out of his warehouses. The ones that you and Anso have been buying muskets for in Rotterdam. They let us go on ahead of them because they could eat their fill before leaving the City, whereas we were coming to feed the men who spent the night here."

  "How many of them?"

  "I really have no idea. They mustered two thousand at the warehouse last night, but once the scandal sheets hit the streets, men began streaming in to pick up their gear. Every block they walked through London, more men joined them. By now perhaps nine or ten thousand."

  "Nine or ten..." Daniel swung around to look along the lines of the regular armies facing each other. The armies were roughly equal but with one having many more cavalryers than the other. "Nine or ten thousand more men with pikes and muskets means we will plow through the king's line ... that is if they don't just run away. Quick, you must be quick with handing out your food. The men who need it most are on the northern flank. If your carts go back a few fields, there is a cart track to Acton. That will take you to the northern flank. John Hampden is there with his men. He will help you."

  He saw Britta looking around and becoming a bit flustered and confused as to where and how to start, so he told her, "Never mind, love, I will go with you." He took both of the women by the hand and pulled them down to the closest trap, a trap which had women sitting on the seats with huge pots of still warm stew on the floor but steadied between their legs. The women all greeted him by name. The big one was the cook from Warwick House. He lifted the Rich girl up in his arms and plunked her down beside Cook. He gave Cook a bus on the cheeks and then whispered, "Don't let this chit out of your sight else there will be hell to pay."

  While Daniel walked down the line of carts saying a few words to every driver, Britta followed him explaining to the women what they were doing. She had to run between carts because her explanations took longer, in the way of women, whereas Daniel was simply barking two or three words to each driver and they were simply nodding or barking back a "yay". In no time at all they reached the cart track he had mentioned and they were less than half way along the line of food carts.

  Once Daniel reached the trap closest to the turn off, he had it turn around and then lead the way north along that track. He had to get the road cleared of the cart traffic before the hoards of new militia coming from London clogged the highway up. He stood at the cross and directed traffic. All the carts to the west of him were to turn around and then turn onto the cart track before he allowed all the carts to the east of him to turn onto the cart track. "Twenty eight," he mumbled to himself. Twenty eight assorted traps, carriages, carts, and drays turned onto the cart track that ran behind Essex's army. The last of them turned just before the first of Warwick's newly recruited militia arrived.

  Britta was standing in the crossroads with Daniel, helping him to direct traffic and making explanations to the women. The sergeants leading Warwick's militia recognized her immediately and called to her, "Where do you want us to deploy, mistress."

  "Great," Daniel mumbled under his breath. "Now we have armies being directed by women." No, not an army. Most of these men were barely trained in their muskets, and would have never known the horror of a battlefield before. He must have said it all aloud because the sergeant who had come over to speak to Britta took offense.

  "Yeh, mate. You tell me about the horrors of a battlefield and I'll tell you about what it's like in Smithfield stock yards on payday when all the butchers apprentices pour out of the alehouses as they close for the night." He turned back to Britta and said, "Who is this burke, love?"

  "Don't mind him," she replied sweetly. "He's the man who brought all your muskets over from Holland, and he is just annoyed that you are about to get them all dirty." The guffaws rippled through the men who were waiting around for orders. "I think it best if half of you stay close to that rise over by the river bank. The prize is control of this road and the embankment so if you cover that rise with men, it will send a strong message to the king that he is never going to control them. Those left over should line up behind the army in case they need help."

  Without even questioning that a twenty something blonde in an alewench bodice was giving them orders, the men passed the word down the line and the hoard of thousands began marching forward again. She called out after them. "I'll be back in about an hour. First I have to go and feed the gallant boys who fought all night to keep this highway out of the king's hands."

  "But you've given the best viewing spot away to the louts," a voice called out. A fancy dressed group of gents were waiting for the pile up of militia to thin out so they could ease their horses closer to the battleground. "That rise is where we were going to view the sport." They were just gawkers and sightseers so everyone else ignored them.

  Daniel looked at the mass of thousands of heads coming towards him from London, then he looked at the long line of carts plodding north along the cart trail, and he too decided to follow Britta's orders. "Come on love. We need to get you to the front of the carts and get the food organized with Hampden. For that you need a horse." He turned to fancy pants with the big mouth and told him, "Where's your manners lad. This lady needs a horse to bypass all of them carts. Loan her yours."

  The gent sneered down his nose at the tall, fair soldier in the puffy and unstylish leather coat. "Moi, you expect moi to give up my fine steed to save the boots of an alehouse whore." His words cause a hush amongst the militia who were marching passed him. The hush turned into four strong hands that reached up and physically lifted him out of his saddle and sat him in a horse pile.

  "You'll not be talkin' to Mistress Britta that way, else you'll be eating that shit. Now tell her the name of yer horse so she can ride it, and yer name so she can return it."

  Fancy pants was struggling to stand up, but getting nowhere against the arms that were holding him down. His face was a mask of anger, but after looking at the dozen rough men who were towering over him he decided that he didn't want to suffer a face plant into a horse pile so he answered quite meekly. "The horse is Silver and I am Percy Whistlethorpe of Whistlethorpe house Kensington."

  Britta swung herself up into the saddle, purposefully showing a lot of leg as a reward to her militia friends, and then she looked down at Percy and said sweetly. "If I don't find you here in an hour or two, then look for your horse at Holland House, Kensington. Just tell the guard that Britta sent you." She looked around at Daniel. "Well, are you coming?
" She lifted her boot out of the stirrup so that Daniel could use it, and then leaned away from him so he could take a handhold of the saddle and swing himself up.

  Luckily it was a small hunters saddle, not a big useful saddle, so there was plenty of room behind it where Daniel could sit on the bare back. Riding double behind Britta made him the most envied man on the battlefield, and there were now over thirty thousand men on this battlefield. A huge number. An unfathomable number.

  A lad in a group of lads called out to him, "How can you resist puttin' yer arms around her and grabbin' her jumblies?"

  "Don't even think about it," she told him over her shoulder, so he simply held on to her waist as they trotted along and tried not to think of how his balls were being crushed by the unyielding bounce of the horses back. He tried pressing in with his knees in hopes of posting, as he would if he had the use of the stirrups, but it didn't help much because this was a very tall hunter with a very broad back. He asked Britta to give him the use of the stirrups since she didn't have the same problem as he, but it was no use. Their angle was all wrong. The ache brought to mind how common it was for England's noblemen to die without heirs. They always blamed their young wives, of course, and never the amount of time they bounced along on horseback.

  They overtook the lead cart, but kept riding ahead to find the best field track to take them east towards Hampden's line. The found a good one which went through two pull-me-down gates and into the field behind Hampden. Daniel slipped off the horse at the first gate and lifted the poles out of the way to open it, and then ran ahead to the next. By then the lead cart was turning onto the track and he got busy waving them through the gates. That done, he ran to catch up to Britta on the horse, but by the time he reached her she was already surrounded by troopers, redcoats, what was left of Holles' brigade. Hampden must have ordered them to the back to keep them as a reserve, but mostly to keep them out of harm's way for they had already fought and suffered enough.