The Tyrant’s Shadow
Page 27
Let her. He crumples the letter in his hand again. No word about Patience. How could Will not have known that Sam would be on edge to hear the least crumb about her?
He remembers her as he last saw her. Crouching low over her husband’s body, her hands daubed in his blood. The sweat on her brow. Terror in her eyes.
‘He’s dead, he’s dead.’
He remembers how she touched a hand to her cheek, and recoiled from the blood. The mark left on her skin so vivid against the white of her blood-leached face.
Why didn’t he run to her then? Trample on the bastard’s bloody body to reach her and lift her and hold on?
So stupid, Sam.
And now, nothing. Should he write? He cannot go back. He will be arrested the instant he tries to return. Thurloe has made clear that his protection extended only as far as Sam’s uninterrupted passage out; not his passport back in. As he understands it, the death of Sidrach Simmonds is at his door: Sam Challoner, the rotten Royalist. The traitorous bastard is not to be exposed for what he was, what he was planning. Sam has the Lord Protector’s private thanks. What use is that?
He rises, pushing himself upright. The scratch of the jute on his hands reminds him why he is here, and he sets about the day’s business. He is not a boy, to rile about unfairness, to mope lovesick when there is work to be done.
It is late when the ship is finally loaded, but they have not missed the tide. He helped with the work himself at the end, throwing off his jacket and getting into the heavy lifting. He took orders from an amused overseer, who tutted at his mistakes and slapped his back with an overfamiliar glee.
He is sore from using muscles that do not get used. His hands are filthy. But it was good to lose himself in physical work, even as the local men mocked him gently in their strange dialect. He will hurry home, wash, pull on a clean shirt. Beautify himself as far as possible. The evening’s early skirmishes will be beginning already. The gallant advances of the rakes, the strategic retreat of the prettiest misses.
Lord, what a bore.
It is a dull sort of day. A dismal sky, with the promise of rain and a wind that seeks out the sweat cooling on his skin. He lengthens his stride. He will be late. He grins as he imagines the patronizing horror with which the lords this and the viscounts that would view his day. Labouring! Lifting! Tallying!
Ah well. Let them mock. They’ll be begging him to spot them money for the gaming tables before the night is out. He thinks of his father suddenly, and the old man’s belief that hard work and pleasure were both necessary conditions for a fulfilled life. Dear old man. Sam has never been sorry he missed his hanging, as he galloped off to offer his sword to the king. He is glad he does not have to remember his father choking on a rope. He can think instead of the old man’s great growl of pleasure at the unveiling of a good meal and a fine claret.
There will be neither tonight, Sam thinks ruefully. Thin wine and watered gravy.
He will have a glass of his own finest claret as he changes his shirt. He brightens a little at the thought. He turns the corner into his street, his step a little bouncier.
And there she is.
Patience.
Standing in front of his door. A black travelling cloak about her shoulders. The hood pushed back. A formless shadow, turning to him. Smiling at him. His heart lurches like a drunkard.
Patience!
He has said it out loud, he realizes, and he laughs.
‘Patience!’
‘Sam!’
‘I did not see you, after, Patience. I had to run. I wanted to speak.’
‘It does not signify. I was not ready to speak.’
‘And now?’
‘I am here.’
She smiles at him, and suddenly they are holding hands and the grinning is wide enough to hurt.
‘We have never spoken, Sam, about this thing between us.’
‘This thing?’
‘Well then. Shall we call it by name? Shall we call it love?’
He laughs.
‘How forward you are, my Patience.’
‘It is just a word. I have travelled across a sea to find you. The time for coyness is past.’
‘It was not a criticism. We shall have honesty between us, when we are married.’
‘Married?’
‘Of course.’
‘How forward you are, Mr Challoner.’
‘Not without cause. Lord, how I have wanted you. What? Why so sad?’
‘Was it not a sin, Sam? To love you while I was married to him?’
‘Let us walk a little. Down to the river. Where do you stay?’
‘At the inn on the square.’
He tucks her hand in the crease in his elbow. He holds it there, tightly. They turn together, and begin to walk towards the river.
‘Now, Patience. Perhaps. Perhaps it is a sin. But I do not know. And I do not presume to know. He gave us hearts, did He not?’
‘Yes.’
‘And those hearts He made belong together, Patience. That much I know. This is what I suggest. Let us concentrate on our own hearts and let the rest be damned.’
Patience stops. She turns to him.
‘You are right, Sam. My heart. Your heart. The world be damned. This matters. This and only this.’
EPILOGUE: COLOGNE
September 1658
PATIENCE PULLS HENRIETTA TO HER FEET. SHE REWARDS her mother with a gummy, radiant smile.
‘Clever girl,’ says Patience. ‘Clever girl.’
Somewhere in her belly there is a kick or a punch. A hammering reminder of new life to come. Patience puts her hands on her stomach and tries to feel for the little foot or hand – she can’t reach it through the layers of cloth. Why so many clothes? Why can’t we just float naked?
Henrietta babbles to get her attention back. Patience smiles at her, and the grin back is so large, so delighted, that she laughs aloud. Poor little Henrietta. She is the centre of their entire world. And she is about to share, to be displaced. Patience hopes it does not worry her too much.
It is an unseasonably warm day, and they are in the garden of their small town house. The grass tickles Patience’s bare feet, and Henrietta is completely naked. Her plump, folding thighs and her big belly are a constant source of joy. The whiteness of her skin against the shocking green of the grass is a miracle.
Everything about Henrietta is miraculous. Patience knows that she is comedic in her maternal verve. No child has ever been more perfect, more beautiful, more adored. She knows that this cannot be true, but she does not care. Reason be damned. Henrietta is her baby, her miracle. And the rest of the world can take its mockery, its cynicism, and be hanged.
The garden seems remarkably beautiful today. Perhaps it is because she is happy. The gardener speaks not one word of English, nor even German. He speaks the strange local dialect to her maid, who translates it into halting German for Patience. She has enough now to get by.
He speaks with his skill, however. Late-season flowers drip from baskets. The beds are bright with reds and pinks and purples. In the vegetable corner, beans and peas and marrows hang swollen and ready to be plucked. The apple tree at the end of the garden, trained against the wall, is drooping with the weight of its crop.
There is a rustle as the opening door of the house catches on the plants that threaten to engulf it. She looks up, expecting to see the maid or Tom. But there is Sam.
Her heart catches.
Oh, the small but glorious victory of loving your own husband, she thinks for the thousandth time. Not just the slippery, thumping love of courtship. This is a deeper thing. This is tracing her child’s face in his face. This is gratitude for the life that she owes to his existence. This is watching Henrietta’s squirming delight at his unexpected appearance. ‘Dada, dada.’
Love. What a stupid, imprecise word for such a welter of things.
‘Sam!’ She says. ‘Why are you home?’
‘And what greeting is that, woman? How are my beautiful girls?
’
He comes out into the garden and bends to kiss her, tickling Henrietta under the chin. The sun catches grey glints in his hair. He pulls a strand of grass from her cheek and sits heavily down next to them.
‘Hey, my Hen Hen. Little Pudding Cat,’ he says, pulling the baby in for a kiss that makes her babble delightedly.
‘Well, Sam? Has something happened? I thought you were expecting a shipment today.’
‘I was. I have some news. I thought I would come and tell you.’
She waits. He looks cheerful enough, so she doesn’t press. She lets him enjoy the pause before the punchline.
‘Cromwell is dead.’
‘Dead?’
He nods. She sits straighter.
‘How?’
‘Details are sparse. An ague, I believe.’
She is stunned.
‘Will,’ she says suddenly. ‘Blackberry.’
‘Well, love. Richard Cromwell is named Protector. The men around the king are abuzz with wild schemes to carry Charles home. But it will not happen. How can it? No. Will is safe, sweetheart.’
A flicker of fear makes her shiver, despite the sunshine. She offers up a silent plea to the sky. Please, please. This time. Let me and mine escape the grind of history.
There ought to be more to say. About Cromwell, about England, about the day three years ago when Sam stopped a bullet hitting Cromwell’s heart. Which is still, now, despite Sam’s efforts. There ought to be more to say, and yet there is not. She kisses him. ‘Stay to eat, while you are home. Out here, in the sun? I have those cold chops, and some cheese. I will open a good bottle.’
‘How can I resist an hour with my favourite girls?’ he says. ‘I will go and fetch it, my beautiful whale. You stay here.’
A chop. A glass of wine. A shared joke with the one you love. An apple for afters, picked from a tree that you own. Quiet pleasures, she thinks, as he heads inside to rouse out the wine. Quiet pleasures to be loved loudly and fiercely and passionately.
‘Sam?’
‘Yes?’ He turns at the door, and she revels in him.
‘Don’t forget the pickle.’
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This book owes a debt to two of my favourite heroines: Isabella in Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure, and Dorothea Brooke in George Elliot’s Middlemarch. Both are women attempting to live meaningful lives in worlds that are antagonistic to their attempts. Both remind the historical-fiction writer of the sin of anachronism: pre-feminist women were not as we are.
The seventeenth century is a fascinating era in the development of women’s political consciousness. Women were beginning to write radical ideas, but shrouding their work in a passive language of permission. ‘God allows me to write despite the fact I am a woman. I do great things for the honour of my husband.’ Margaret Cavendish, who plays a cameo role in this story, is one of the first to articulate a different story. ‘I am a woman, and have a right to be heard on my own terms.’
The burgeoning consciousness of women is just one of the strands which makes this such an extraordinary era. The 1640s were thunder, bloodshed and regicide. The 1650s are a quieter, more intricate story of hope and disillusionment.
At the centre of this story is Oliver Cromwell. As bitter, bloody and vile as the English Civil War undoubtedly was, its aftermath could have been worse. Cromwell was a bulwark against anarchy and extremism – a flawed champion of the moderate line. I was expecting a demi-monster, and found someone more nuanced and far more interesting.
Among the most useful primary sources I used to think my way into the seventeenth century were the political works of Milton, and his unlikely chum, Marchamont Nedham. The works of Margaret Cavendish. Of course, Sam Pepys – although his diaries are set a few years later. Thomas Carlyle’s editions of Oliver Cromwell’s speeches and letters, which are enlivened by the editor’s extraordinary and idiosyncratic notes. The mother’s legacies contained in Silvia Brown (ed.): Women’s Writing in Stuart England, are fascinating insights into the domestic lives of women. The poetry of Marvell and Milton for Cromwell, and Lovelace for the Cavaliers. Thomas Hobbes and John Wilkins – for political and natural science.
I have tried to remain as faithful as possible to the events of the mid-1650s. Simmonds’ plan to assassinate Cromwell is based on similar plots. For more on the secondary sources, and how this book found its shape, please visit my website: Antoniasenior.com.
As well as the fictional ones, this book owes large debts to a few real heroines and heroes. Louise Cullen at Corvus has been kind and diplomatic in reminding me that plot matters as much as politics. Thank you also to Sara O’Keeffe and Jane Selley.
A huge debt, as ever, to my agent Andrew Gordon at David Higham Associates. Thank you for your advice and support; both are invaluable. On the rare occasions I don’t follow your advice, I always wish I had!
This book is dedicated to my sisters – I do not tell them often enough how much I love and admire them both. Thanks also to my mother, Elizabeth Senior, who is my most constant and partisan reader. For beyond-the-call-of-duty babysitting of my trio of gorgeous girls, and for their moral support, I owe a huge thank you to Bill and Sandra West.
Thank you to Nick Roe for sharing his expertise. Thank you to all those friends who have listened to me whinge about the writing of this book: Megan Skipper, Annabel Roe, Clare Moore, Anna Mazzola, Matt Ashton, Sophie Morgan, Charlotte Barratt, Leigh Victor, Neva Chowdhury.
Finally, all gratitude and love to Colin, my husband, who is worried that everyone will think he is the model for Sidrach Simmonds. Colin, I promise, is the anti-Sid; for which I am profoundly grateful.
Also by Antonia Senior
Treason’s Daughter
The Winter Isles
Published in hardback in Great Britain in 2017 by Corvus, an imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd.
Copyright © Antonia Senior, 2017
The moral right of Antonia Senior to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities, is entirely coincidental.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Hardback ISBN: 978 1 78239 661 1
E-book ISBN: 978 1 78239 662 8
Printed in Great Britain.
Corvus
An imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd
Ormond House
26–27 Boswell Street
London
WC1N 3JZ
www.corvus-books.co.uk