The Prisoner

by James Darke

  And her nails! Many a time John would have to conceal himself from his mother and father as he washed at the pump in the yard, so bloodied were

  his back and shoulders from her ferocity.

  Truly it roused him, yet it also concerned him. For at such moments Mary Villers, placid, blonde Mary, would be like a woman possessed of demons. Yet the rest of the time she was quiet and decorous, as befitted the youngest child of such a religious family, paying suitable attendance at the church in Widford.

  Some scant months earlier two things had come to pass, on the same day, that had effected a radical change in their relationship.

  It had been a warm day, a watery sun struggling through early mist. Mary had come calling, finding that both of John’s parents were out. Joshua

  Lightlantern had been despatched on some errand or another, and the quiet house was theirs to command.

  While he made sure that the bolt was slipped on the doors, both front and rear, Mary walked up the creaking stairs. In the stillness he caught the whisper of sound as his beloved lady let her dress and shift fall to the floor of the bedroom. The bed protested feebly as she lay across it; halfway up the stairs he could imagine what he would find, and the

  front of his breeches became uncomfortably tight, in the manner that had now become familiar to him.

  Mary was waiting, laying on top of the neat patchwork coverlet. She was quite naked, but for a length of demure black ribbon knotted about her

  throat. She was smiling up at him, her right hand busily burrowing between her spread thighs. Her nipples were erect, casting small shadows across her firm breasts. In the dim light of the curtained room she seemed like an erotic nymph, seeking drowned mariners in her undersea cavern.

  John breathed a great sigh and lay across her.

  But that morning had been different.

  Her passions had raged more strongly than before. The gag barely sufficed to check her screaming and blood came worming from the corner of her mouth where she had bitten through her own lips. It was only by using his own great strength that John was able to remain safely in the saddle, thrusting at her, feeling her hips grinding up against him, so hard that he feared for an accident to his manhood.

  Just as he sensed his seed boiling in his loins and he prepared to spend, he felt her shudder beneath him as if someone had thrust a dagger between her third and fourth ribs. Her whole body went limp and he felt the warmth of her urine flooding against his thighs. John eased back from her and saw that her head hung sideways on her neck as if she’d been poleaxed. Her eyes were open and staring, pupils tiny and rolled upwards so that they seemed all white. Mary’s mouth was open, lips pale around the gag. Breath came in juddering gasps, hoarse in her chest. Her fists were clenched, nails dug deep into her own palms.

  John had come close to panic. He had pulled away from her, his erection fading like the dew in the morning. He ripped the gag from her mouth,

  patting her cheeks and chafing her wrists. Covering her with a heavy blanket he had run naked down into the kitchen. Returning with some brandy, he had forced a few drops between her parted lips, using more to rub on her skin.

  After a minute or two she began to recover consciousness, coughing and spluttering, trying to sit up. Colour had flooded back to her cheeks and

  she had seemed puzzled and angry at what had happened.

  But it had frightened John, fearing that any recurrence of the strange happening might even lead to her death.

  The second event that day was the news that Matthew Hopkins, the Witchfinder-General, and his colleagues were abroad. He was reputed to have

  hanged a dozen women and men together, not fifty miles from Hertford town. John had come across Lightlantern that afternoon, talking of the events

  with a stranger. A travelling tinker who had been present at the mass execution, and who was telling his story with much lip-smacking relish. John was sickened by the man’s enthusiasm for the suffering of poor wretches, but one thing that he said struck a chill note.

  ‘The weakling of the litter was but sixteen summers of age. Pretty, like a doll, with hair colour of straw. Hopkin’s creature, Stearne, had his way with her, they said. She had lain with most men in the district, bewitching them with her wiles and potions. They did say that what gave her away as the spawn of Satan was that she kept no hold on her passion.’

  ‘What does that mean?’ Lightlantern had asked the tinker, while John listened eagerly for the reply.

  ‘Her senses deserted her while coupling, friend. She swooned away, eyes rolled back in her skull, and she mouthed strange, beastly words. By that

  did they know her as a witch.’

  After that day, John had been steadfastly refusing to lie again with Mary, drawing on a fund of excuses that he hoped would last until they could be wed and there would be no shame in their bedding. But until that day, he was set in his mind that he and Mary must keep chaste.

  He had told her that he now wished to save their passion for lawful loving and she had argued long and bitter. But finally she had agreed, lowering her head as she whispered her passive consent to his word.

  Now she was here.

  Mary Villers walked into his bedroom and he struggled to sit up, cursing under his breath as he banged the splinted elbow on the carved head board, feeling himself flush beneath the heavy nightdress that he wore. Though Mary had seen him naked often enough he felt a damnable ninny

  to be seen in such a way. His mother was nodding and grinning in the doorway.

  ‘I shall be off now, son,’ she said. ‘I have to go and meet your father. He has mislaid his case of knives and has to cut a stone for Master Otway.’

  She rested a hand on the sleeve of the young girl. ‘You must take care and not rouse his blood today, my dear. Doctor Ferris says he must be calm and

  quiet.’

  ‘Will you be gone long, Mistress Ferris?’ asked Mary Viliers.

  ‘I hope to return in time enough for the evening meal. Before dark. Joshua is also out on an errand, so you two young people must needs guard the house for us against robbers and other sturdy vagabonds.’

  She blew a kiss to her son, who blushed yet more deeply, then turned and clicked her way down the narrow staircase, along the flagged hail and out

  through the front door. He heard the sound of her feet through the loose stones of the path and the creaking of the gate.

  ‘The rest is silence,’ grinned John, trying to break the uncomfortable moment that lay between them, like a dead hand on a sword-hilt.

  ‘She is a good woman,’ said-Mary.

  ‘Aye. And right glad that her only son’s war is now fought and over.’

  ‘Until your elbow heals, John, my dearest. Then you will doubtless be off again for glory.’

  He shook his head, patting the bed for her to sit down beside him, but she chose to seat herself in a rush-bottomed chair at one side of the room. It had been a long time since they had last seen each other. Though Jabez had approved of John’s choice of fighting for the Parliament, Mary had been less than happy. Moaning that she would never see him again and that she would be a widow with no money, or caring for some poor legless cripple.

  There had been no definite talk of a wedding between the two families, but it had been gradually understood that they might wed once the battles

  had ceased. Whenever that might be.

  ‘You did not come to see me,’ the girl pouted, accusingly. Blue eyes fixed on the wall behind his head as though she had no wish to meet his gaze.

  ‘I was home scant hours to collect horses. I was trying to break Morgana when . . .‘ he paused. ‘When she broke me. I vow I would have come to call upon you that very afternoon, had it not been for the mishap.’

  ‘Just to call upon me?’

  ‘Aye, Mary.’

  Would you not have wished to do . . . more, John?’

  The suggestion could not have been more clear had she writ it large in the blackest of ink upon a grea
t sheet of parchment and he felt himself

  blushing yet again.

  ‘We have sworn to keep chaste now until we be wed.’

  ‘You swore,’ she said, voice rising. ‘I did but agree as a dutiful maiden should when her master speaks.’

  He was shamed by her words and she saw it in his face. Relenting. ‘They say, John, that you have been hurt grievously.’

  For the first time she looked directly at him and John felt his heart leap in his chest for her beauty. And his loins suddenly filled with desire for her body. Despite his own fears and doubts he wished to fornicate with her. The day was chill and she wore a heavy cloak over the white starched linen apron and brown dress. Her hair was coiled up beneath a modest coif. Mary was most wonderfully beautiful.

  ‘I will never march to war again. But Twill ride as well as ever in a few weeks. Father says that less than a month and I will be hale once more.’

  She stood up and stepped to the side of the bed, placing herself just out of his reach. For the first time she was smiling and he felt the tension easing away from them both.

  ‘Your mother’s message spoke of some kind of inheritance.’

  ‘Yes. An uncle has joined the choirs celestial and I am shortly to have one thousand guineas for my own usage.’

  ‘A thousand guineas! That is what I. . . I am so pleased for us, beloved.’

  ‘I shall buy land, Mary. Once this damned arm is mended I shall saddle the iron-mouthed and evil Morgana and go to Cambridge. There to examine

  cattle to be bought for my farm.’

  ‘Our farm, John?’

  ‘Of course. You look exceedingly well, my love.’

  She shuffled a little way along the bed towards him, her hand spidering until it reached his foot. Ankle. Knee.

  ‘Mary!’

  ‘Your servant is out and you heard the words of your mother.’

  He swallowed, finding that there was, of a sudden, not sufficient air in the bedroom to fill his lungs. The small fire in the grate spat and crackled as some damp wood caught and burned.

  ‘It has been long months, John. I have been cold where you should make me warm.’

  Her fingers were working their way to the tops of his legs, gripping him through the blankets.

  ‘Mary, we have agreed.’

  ‘Aye, but you needs must know that a woman feels the need for loving as much as any man. More, some say. You have your great tom leech under there that should be applied to my chilled parts to warm them. What say you, my eagle?’

  ‘I say . . .‘ his voice was cracking in the upper register and he tried again. ‘I say that I said what I did because I believed it was right. As with all things I have ever done. I believed in the cause of right and justice and so I went to fight for the land. I saw sights that made me doubt whether there was indeed a right or wrong. Now the Lord has sent me

  this injury, this affliction, to show that I needs must remain a man of peace. A farmer and not a soldier.’

  ‘Then if you truly love me we shall be wed.’

  ‘Oh, yes. Of course we will.’

  ‘If we are to be husband and wife, and if we have already committed carnal sin many times, why must we stop?’

  Her hands reached for him and he pulled away from her touch. Loath to allow her to feel how his body rebelled against his commands and swelled

  for her.

  But at the back of his mind was the vivid picture of how she had been. How she had swooned away in the throes of her violent, almost inhuman passion. And of what he had learned of the practices of the witchfinders.

  ‘No,’ pulling away from her to the further side of the bed. ‘No. We have sworn to wait now until we are wed. That is my word and that is my bond. I

  would not be forsworn for this, Mary.’

  She looked away, her hands fumbling with the drew-laces of her bodice. He could see that she was angry, her breath coming fast as though she had walked a steep road. Then she shook her head and turned back to look at him. Whatever battle she had been fighting with herself had clearly now been won.

  ‘Then we must soon set the date for our wedding, dearest John.’

  His mind was greatly eased to see how his sweet heart accepted his decision that they should still refrain from any sexual activity. Though he was almost overcome with desire for her body and her passion.

  ‘Aye, soon, Mary. First my elbow. Then to Cambridge. The lawyer is there who holds our affairs. Mayhap I shall be able to obtain from him the thousand guineas that he keeps and I shall purchase some cattle for my. . .‘ he corrected himself immediately, ‘for our farm.’

  ‘And the land?’

  He nodded. ‘The land shall come first. A goodly plot where we may live long and well, with our thriving family. God’s wounds, but there is yet so

  much that must be done!’

  ‘But when can we. . .?‘ she insisted, voice plaintive, hands knotting in her lap as she sat once more in the chair.

  ‘It is still winter, my love. Let us wait a whiles until I am hale once more. I shall then ask your father for your hand in marriage. Until then let us keep our formal betrothal to ourselves. Perhaps we can be wed by. . . by May. That would be wonderful, my love. A May bride with the warmth of

  the sun on our faces and bright blossom on the heavy branches. It will be fine, Mary. A goodly day for a goodly bride.’

  ‘Will you tell your parents?’

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘Your mother will raise no word?’

  ‘Nor Father. He likes you, Mary.’

  ‘There is little love these parlous days for the Ferris family, John.’

  It was a bolt of thunder from a serene summer’s sky.

  ‘What? What do you say, woman?’

  She looked into the fire where a log was crumbling into soft ashes.

  ‘Not you. Your enlistment was well done. But your father and mother make scant secret of their own fondness for the ways of the King and heresy.’

  ‘Heresy! I do not believe what my ears are hearing, Mary.’

  ‘It is true. There are those, and you must pardon me for repeating this, but you should know, dearest. Know that there are those around the villages who believe your father and mother are in league with the . . . with the Devil himself.’

  ‘This is such foolishness.’

  ‘I know that, John. And so do all folk of good sense. But your father is a skilled man at healing. And your mother aids him.’

  ‘He is a man of the greatest virtue.’

  ‘He has offended with his harsh tongue.’

  ‘My father does not suffer fools right gladly, as you know.’

  ‘I know that your father does not suffer those he believes to be fools at all,’ she replied with a flash of fire.

  ‘I knew naught of this.’

  ‘It has only b1own up as the winds of war drive hardship to us all. Those who are for the King in these parts are not greatly loved.’

  ‘But, witchcraft, Mary! It is so foolish as to be almost laughable.’

  ‘Almost, I grant you. Aye, that I do grant you.’ She stood up with decision. ‘I shall talk no more of it. It be but foolish gossip as you say. And when the sun comes it will melt.’ She stood by the window, looking out across the garden. ‘Oh, there is a small coney, scampering for its burrow. So sweet and innocent.’

  John was bewildered. It was such a day as he had never known. The news of the money and the passionate minutes with Mary. His own final commitment to marriage. Plans for a farm. And then the mortar-shell of his parents being suspected as heretics, or even witches.

  But she was right. It was a spectre of winter and the threat of the war moving closer to the area. With the spring it would go away and all would be as it had been.

  But his fears were strengthened that very night, when a large flint came crashing through one of the windows of their kitchen, nearly striking, his

  mother. Both his parents tried to pass the event off,

  But Joshua came in, se
eing the broken glass. Not another one, Doctor,’ he said.

  So it had not been the first time that some vindictive local had shown dislike. John decided that it might be better if he could persuade his parents to move from Hertford, to some safer town.

  But there was time enough for that.

  Less than twenty miles from Hertford, a small caravan was camped for the night. A covered wagon, with a woman asleep in it. A large tent with three

  gipsies. And a smaller tent with a middle-aged man dozing alone in it.

  Robert Monk, witchfinder, was on the move, hungry for silver.

  And blood.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The situation with the good people of Hertford and its surrounding villages grew worse. John Ferris’ elbow finally healed. Healed as much as it was ever going to. And he was once more able to get out and about.

  Only then was he able to experience for himself some of the hostility that Mary Viliers had mentioned to him that cold afternoon in his room.

  There were turned backs where once he might have looked for smiling faces. There were no more invitations to dine with the local gentry, when all

  three of the Ferris family would have been welcome at any table in that part of the county.

  Only once did he try to raise the matter with either of his parents.

  Doctor Ferris sniffed and half-smiled. A weary, saddened smile. ‘They call me warlock, John, and your dear mother a witch. Such are the times we

  have fallen to now all men are to be considered the equal of another. We must persevere until the better days of sense come again.’

  His mother started to cry and ran away from him when he mentioned it, tugging her apron over her face.

  After that he held his own council and simply kept his guard. He also took some care to make sure that folk knew, while he was there, he did not expect any trouble to come the way of his parents. And that if anyone was caught throwing stones or doing any other sort of mischief then he would personally run his cavalry sword through both their kneecaps.

  So the active trouble disappeared. For a time. But the whispering and hatred seemed to increase.