‘A-Monmouth and the Protestant religion!’
Ordering her charges to remain where they were, Miss Blake moved toward Monmouth bearing gifts, a Bible in one hand and a drawn sword in the other. Lady Henrietta murmured bitterly to Grey from one side of her mouth, ‘It was neither a Bible nor a sword that she had in her hand last night.’
There was an orgasmic flush to the schoolmistress’s cheeks when the duke’s eyes met and held hers as he graciously accepted the gifts. They stood for a moment; aware only of each other as they both did a parting lover’s sexual re-run through their memories. Then the rebel duke took one quick step backwards to snap the silver cord of intimacy, freeing himself from the teacher to make a brief speech. Then he escorted Miss Blake back to her pupils, kissing each of the young girls in turn. Led by a red-faced mistress, they marched off with little arms swinging and heads high. It was an example of discipline that Monmouth’s untaught soldiers could never hope to emulate.
As the children went on their way, a distinguished-looking horseman rode up to dismount in front of the duke, dropping to one knee, reaching for the hand of Monmouth and kissing it.
‘Whence came you, my good sir, and what is your business with me?’ the duke inquired when the man came up off his knee.
‘My name is John Whiting, Your Grace,’ the rider said humbly.
‘Another courageous recruit to my colours, eh?’
‘I come to be with you and the Protestant religion,’ Whiting explained, ‘but it is contrary to my persuasion to appear in arms, for I am a Quaker, sire.’
‘You are heartily welcome, John Whiting, and you may serve in whatever capacity you deem fitting,’ Monmouth said, shaking the man by the hand.
Watching the little scene, Henrietta muttered sardonically, ‘What a rebellion! He takes a dried-up spinster into his bed and a gutless Quaker into his army.’
‘The taste of sour grapes is distorting your beautiful features, my dear,’ remarked Lord Grey of Werke, who had once resignedly condoned his wife’s relationship with the Duke of Monmouth, but had actively encouraged it of late.
‘I could tend the injuries of your wounded, Your Grace, and satisfy the spiritual needs of both them and your dead,’ the Quaker was offering.
‘Then that is how you must serve me, John Whiting,’ the rebel duke clapped a friendly hand on the Quaker’s shoulder, ‘for I ask of no man that he goes against his conscience.’
‘And what of a woman and her conscience, James?’ Henrietta asked archly and softly when the duke had moved away from the newcomer.
‘My sweet Henrietta,’ Monmouth replied for her ears only. ‘I know every part of you, most intimately, but for the life of me I can’t recall having met your conscience.’
Wanting to hurt him, she replied, ‘It would seem to be as elusive as your legitimacy, Your Grace.’
The further they went down the track the uneasier Sergeant Jack became. From the top of the downs they had glimpsed McFeeley, the two women, and another soldier making their way through the trees up the hill. He had agreed with Tonge at the time that if not sighting a Monmouth patrol, they should walk openly to meet the others so that there would be no mistaken firing of muskets. It was a reasonable idea, but now he could practically feel an increasingly potent danger in the atmosphere.
In the days he had spent with Lieutenant Tonge Sergeant Jack had come to regard him as a capable officer who could be relied on in a showdown. Once the lieutenant had learned that Jack’s taciturny was a character trait rather than a personal reaction to him, they had got along well. Sitting by their night fire the lieutenant had talked to him of combat in Poland, of his recent marriage to Nancy, his childhood sweetheart from his home town of Chatham, and his pending promotion to captain, which Tonge hoped would result in a desk job so that he could spend maximum time with his beloved Nancy.
‘Do you feel the same as me right now, Jack?’ Tonge asked as they went round a bend in the track and the hills rose steeper than ever on each side of them.
‘If you’re feeling that something just ain’t right, sir, then I’m with you.’
Sliding his musket down from his shoulder, Lieutenant Tonge said, ‘It seems likely that it’s too late to do anything about it. I’d welcome any suggestion from you, Sergeant.’
Inclined to agree with the officer that they had passed some invisible point of no return where the hazard, whatever it was, was concerned, Jack was disappointed that McFeeley and the women, together with the end of the mission he was on with Tonge, had come so close but now looked very much in doubt. Scanning the hills up ahead, Jack, knowing that the men behind followed in two ranks of five, put his idea to the lieutenant.
‘See that crag just up ahead there, sir?’ he asked, continuing when Tonge nodded. ‘Well, what if we split – you to the right, taking your five with you, and me to the left?’
Tonge quickly checked out the plan. Where the rocky crag was protruding, the trees on the hills were closer spaced, thereby offering them more cover. Not only was Sergeant Jack’s plan sound, it was the only possible one.
‘Five more paces, Jack, and we’ll split,’ he told the sergeant, turning over his shoulder to tell the men in a low voice, ‘On my command. You five men behind me make it to those trees up on the right. You men, follow the sergeant up to the trees on the left.’
Jack found himself counting the paces – one, two, three … That was when the first crack of a musket, ear-splittingly loud as it shattered the silence, came from up on the hill to their right.
‘The avoidance of criticism, Colonel Kirke,’ Lord John Churchill said flatly, ‘requires one to say nothing, do nothing, and therefore become nothing.’
‘I am distressed that you consider I would venture to level criticism, my lord. My purpose was to bring to you a consensus of military opinion in the campaign against James Scott. It is not, I assure you, my personal opinion,’ said Colonel Percy Kirke toadingly, making a qualifying statement.
En route to Bristol where the first major confrontation with Monmouth’s army was anticipated, Colonel Kirke and his notorious regiment of ‘lambs’ had joined Churchill at Shepton Mallet. Coming up from Ilchester, eager to push on and get into the fight, Kirke had been frustrated to learn that Churchill had received orders to halt his column and await the arrival of Lord Feversham.
These orders had also annoyed Churchill while at the same time he welcomed them. He was aware that Feversham, disabled by trepanning, was putting on a display of power when it was safe to do so – before the event. When the armies of the king moved on from here, the responsibility and any blame would be Churchill’s but the kudos would go to Feversham. The delay pleased Churchill, who was still hoping for news of Lady Sarah. With Critchell’s favourite, Lieutenant McFeeley, seemingly having failed in his rescue mission, Critchell had ridden out to learn what he could. Churchill accepted what the captain would do if it became necessary, but he was petrified by contemplation of what it would do to a man to turn the guns on his commanding officer’s wife and friend.
Feversham arrived just before noon, sitting on his horse with the vacant look that everyone except Churchill now regarded as normal. Having known Feversham as a brilliant soldier, tutor and mentor, Churchill found himself continually and unhappily comparing the man of yesterday to the walking dead figure of today. Coming with Feversham was a troop of Life Guards and sixty Horse Grenadiers. Riding at his side was stern-faced Colonel Oglethorp of the Household Cavalry.
Studying the maps put before him, nodding and shaking his head in agreement with whatever Churchill or Kirke put forward, Feversham, Churchill was sure, was neither seeing nor hearing anything. The sleepiness that was characteristic of his injuries was overtaking him, and Churchill spoke urgently to get his request across before Feversham’s consciousness drifted into the regular coma in which his body worked reasonably well, providing it gorged itself on food, but his mind did not function.
‘My ideal would be to move on to Keynsham,’ he to
ld Feversham after explaining that his wife and companion were still possibly in the hands of Monmouth, and that Captain Claude Critchell was at that very moment attempting to establish the situation regarding the two ladies. He added, ‘There would be nothing lost if I remained there until Captain Critchell rejoined me.’
Taking the line of least resistance, Feversham was nodding his plated head in easy agreement when Percy Kirke butted in.
‘While deferring to the superior rank and ability of my lord Churchill, my Lord, I request permission to speak,’ Kirke said.
‘Go ahead, Colonel Kirke,’ Feversham said, fading in and out of the conversation.
‘While recognizing and sympathizing with my Lord Churchill’s dilemma concerning Lady Sarah,’ Kirke began, ‘I am of the opinion that any further delay will give James Scott an advantage from which we may never find it possible to recover, my lord.’
‘I can understand that, Colonel Kirke, but you will agree that Lady Sarah and Rachel must be given our consideration,’ Feversham said, impressing and encouraging Churchill.
‘Absolutely, my Lord Feversham,’ Kirke said with an open-eyed yet bogus sincerity, ‘but I am convinced that I will be able to make a strategic advance and take up important ground without endangering the ladies further.’
Feversham turned this over in his head for some time, an exercise that rapidly tired him. Voice slurring, he gave his consent to Kirke’s project. ‘As long as I have your assurance regarding the two unfortunate ladies, Colonel Kirke, then you must go ahead.’
Less than an hour later a despondent John Churchill watched Colonel Percy Kirke ride out ahead of his regiment. The concern Kirke had expressed over Lady Sarah and Rachel, together with his assurance that he would do nothing to cause the two women more difficulties, rang hollow for Churchill. Kirke and his whole regiment, the infamous ‘lambs’ were murderers who used a uniform to excuse their foul deeds.
Although expected, the shot that rang out gave McFeeley’s body an uncomfortable start. From behind him came concerted gasps from Lady Sarah and Rachel, then Piper cursed under his breath as the columns behind and the lieutenant split to run up the banks. The first shot from the rebels had brought down the soldier who was immediately behind the officer. Watching the man writhing as he lay on the trail, his body jerking backwards so that he was almost doubled grotesquely with the back of his head against his buttocks, McFeeley assumed the soldier’s spine had been snapped by a bullet.
A volley of shots followed, bringing down yet another king’s man before he could reach cover. Then Jack and the lieutenant were behind the trees, proving what good soldiers they were by taking the fight to the enemy.
‘Can’t you do something to help?’ Lady Sarah inquired now that the noise of battle permitted speech.
‘We can’t take the risk,’ McFeeley told her, wishing that it wasn’t so. Had it just been Piper and himself here they could have come up behind the Monmouth patrol to use surprise to have them run.
The exchange of fire became more intense. Despite being outnumbered, the king’s men were giving a good account of themselves. Seeing a Monmouth man come into sight as he pitched sideways from behind a tree to roll head over heels down the bank, McFeeley felt certain that his comrade had shot the man.
A king’s soldier suddenly shrieked out, the gurgling that came at the end of his scream of pain a sure sign that he was mortally wounded. This acted as some kind of unofficial signal for the Monmouth soldiers. Moving expertly from tree to tree, confident in their superior number, they started a relentless advance. The soldiers of the king were forced to pull back. The Monmouth soldiers’ tactics were plain to McFeeley. Behind Jack and the others the banks comprised just grass and a few low bramble bushes. The king’s men would very soon run out of trees and would be exposed fully to enemy musket fire.
Recognizing this, and that the only hope for what remained of his men was for them to escape over the tops of the high hills, the lieutenant gambled everything on a personal act of bravery.
Stepping out from behind a tree, firing as he came, he ran towards the enemy. Dropping to the ground, he adopted a half-sitting position to reload and ram his musket as bullets flew around him. McFeeley didn’t doubt that what the lieutenant was doing was courageous and brought about by desperation. It failed in its aim. Before any of the king’s men could take advantage of the diversion and get away, the lieutenant was coming up with his musket reloaded when a Monmouth bullet hit him in the head. It caused the lieutenant to spin on his heels like a top for several revolutions, before he flopped to the grass and rolled sideways down on to the track below.
Keenly aware that now Jack and the other soldiers were doomed, McFeeley had to do something to help. Moving Lady Sarah and Rachel into a place among the trees where they were concealed by bushes, he told them what was to happen.
‘Piper and I have got to join in the fight,’ he told them tersely. ‘If we don’t, then once Monmouth’s men have finished off the others they are certain to find us. I think we can make it, and I want you both to stay here and stay quiet until I come back for you.’
‘What if you don’t come back?’ Sarah asked the question McFeeley had been dreading.
‘I’ll be back,’ he said because there was nothing else to say, even though the two women and he knew that he couldn’t be certain. After he had checked that Piper’s musket was loaded and that the soldier had shot, powder and his ramrod with him, they were about to move out when Lady Sarah reached out to put a hand on McFeeley’s arm. His whole system jangling at her touch, he looked into her face that was upturned to him. Lips moving as if she was going to say something, they then began to quiver. Remaining silent, she snatched her hand back as if his arm had become scorchingly hot. Then she turned away from him.
Moving off with Piper, the two of them dashing from tree to tree, McFeeley wondered what Sarah had intended. The contact between them when she had touched him had been sensual, but there was much more to it than that. For McFeeley there had been a reminder in it of what he had felt when with Rosin. He pushed as much of it as he could from his mind. In his time he had run considerable risks in his assignations but even to think of dallying with the wife of Lord John Churchill was enough to have him thrown in the Tower.
Nevertheless, when he caught sight of his first Monmouth soldier, who stood facing a tree with his musket aimed at where Jack and the others were and with his back to him, McFeeley said a little prayer that he wouldn’t die before knowing what had moved Lady Sarah as he was leaving her.
There was no time for chivalry, for introducing sportsmanship into warfare. McFeeley fired, hitting the soldier in the back. As he watched his man go down like a felled tree, he heard Piper’s musket fire. McFeeley knew that now the Monmouth men were aware of others behind them, speed was of the essence.
With no time to reload his musket, he saw a soldier turn from where he had been using a nearby tree for cover, The Monmouthian was bringing his musket round towards McFeeley, who lifted his weapon high and ran with it, stock first, at the soldier. The soldier was young. There was both shock and fear on a face that was made ugly by an oversized chin. As always when in battle, McFeeley had to contend with and quell the strange feeling that came the moment an enemy came out of anonymity and into a body made of flesh and blood. This boy in front of him wanted to go on living, deserved to go on living just as he did, but a situation that was not of their own making decreed that one of them must die. Disciplining himself, McFeeley drove the musket forward into the young face. Feeling the stock connect to squash flesh and splinter bone, he rammed harder. The Monmouth boy’s head was banged back against the tree and the force of McFeeley’s blow cracked open the skull like a coconut.
Seven
PIPER HAD HOLD of his musket with both hands close to the muzzle and was swinging it round and round over his head, The stock clumped against the head of a Monmouth soldier, dropping him. McFeeley made the most of the break to reload his musket.
&nbs
p; Sergeant Jack had realized that something was happening to the rear of the Monmouth party and had begun an assault of his own. The Monmouthians, no longer sure how many guns they were facing, began an immediate withdrawal. McFeeley wounded one who was able to keep lamely going and was out of sight by the time he had reloaded. Piper killed a Monmouth man who had clambered down from a tree hoping to flee, while Jack or one of his men brought down another.
Now the guns had fallen quiet. In the new silence that followed the only disruption was an occasional long and low moaning from a wounded man who lay among the bodies strewn across the track or lying awkwardly against the banks with that distinctive flatness of the dead.
‘Check that out!’ McFeeley ordered Piper, who stepped carefully among the bodies, his musket pointing downwards in readiness.
Satisfied, McFeeley hurried back to where the two women anxiously awaited him, telling them, ‘It’s over, and the party sent out to meet us is here. Come along.’
They went with him down the hill, turning away in revulsion as they passed each body. Up ahead Sergeant Jack was kneeling beside the dead lieutenant. As they approached Jack he took something from the officer’s pocket and stood up to put whatever it was inside of his torn tunic.
‘It’s for his wife …’ Jack started to explain, showing no reaction to McFeeley being in a Monmouth uniform. Then, obviously referring to the dead, he asked, ‘What do we do, sir?
It was a problem. They couldn’t carry the bodies with them, and the remaining six men of Jack’s squad looked to be exhausted, with one of them trying to staunch the blood flowing freely from a wound in the upper part of his left arm.
‘Let the dead bury the dead,’ Jonathan Piper suggested laconically from his seat on a rock.
McFeeley's Rebellion Page 12
