The Prisoner

by James Darke

  April. The twenty-second day of the month. A damp day, warmer than it had been, with a feeble sun trying to work its way through a morning mist.

  John had saddled Morgana, taking care to keep well clear of the animal’s rear hooves. Since his own accident the mare had kicked three more people,

  including the ostler at the Pied Merlin.

  His father was away on business, delivering a child for a farmer out beyond Ware. Despite the building animosity against him, Thomas Ferris continued to do what he could for those who still welcomed his services. Though their numbers seemed to shrink by the day. But Ruth had come to the front gate to see her son off on his travels.

  ‘You have the money safe?’

  ‘Aye. But I shall need little of it. The bulk is secure with Father in his safe-box.’

  ‘And you have food for the journey?’

  ‘Mother. I have been a soldier. I know how to provision myself. I have food and drink enough to get me to Cambridge and back thrice over.’

  ‘It is only that . . .‘

  ‘I know.’

  ‘You do understand, son?’

  ‘I do, Mother.’

  ‘You will return in three days?’

  ‘I trust that I will.’

  ‘God go with you, my son.’

  ‘And with you, Mother.’

  He swung up into the high saddle, feeling a twinge of pain in his damaged elbow. His mother smiled tremulously up at him and then turned suddenly, running back towards the house. John was about to set his heels to Morgana’s bay flanks when he saw Joshua Lightlantern standing watching him from the corner of the garden.

  ‘What is it, Joshua?’

  The old man moved closer, looking around as though he feared that he might be watched. He carried a billhook in his right hand, its edge

  polished smooth with use. As usual his breeches were held up with knotted twine.

  ‘Make haste to return, Master John.’

  ‘I have to see the cattle, Joshua. Before hazarding my inheritance on that farm I saw, I must see what the cost will be of filling it.’

  ‘Aye, well. . . Be not longer than you needs be.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I’ve said more than I wished, Master.’

  ‘You mean that my mother and father are in some danger?’

  The servant rubbed a gnarled forefinger along the side of his bony nose.

  ‘There’s those that have scant love for the Doctor. Some say aye and some say nay, if ye take my drift.’

  ‘I know of the damned gossips and ditch-rakers, Joshua. But there has been no more than words.’

  ‘That’s as may be, Master John. I have heard. . .‘ The sentence drifted away on the light wind.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I will not say.’

  ‘Then be damned to you!’ snapped Ferris, his right hand feeling for the hilt of his sabre a sudden rage flooding through his veins.

  Lightlantern stepped quickly back, fear filling his rheumy eyes. ‘Strike old Joshua, Master . . .‘ he quavered. ‘I needs must dwell in this town. I will not sink with all and that is my dread.’

  ‘I am sorry, Joshua. Sorry for my anger.’ He slowed his breathing, patting the mare on the side of the neck. Recovering his own composure. ‘But my parents are more dear to me than I can say. I have heard the foolish talk of witchery and selling of souls to Satan. It will pass. And no man here in Hertford would dare lay hands on them while I live. Nor harm you, old friend.’

  Lightlantern showed little sign of being reassured by the words. ‘Mayhap,’ he muttered. ‘But great ill can be wrought by words, Master John.’

  Though Ferris tried Once more to press him as to his meaning, the old man would have none of it. Mumbling that there was work to be done in the small orchard at the back of the neat house, walking away, shoulders stooped, the billhook swinging in his hand.

  As he walked his horse away from his home, John even considered abandoning his mission to Cambridge. Perhaps it might be better to take the threat seriously. On a sudden impulse he turned the mare’s head towards the Widford road, deciding that he would call upon his betrothed and seek her opinion.

  The day was fine and his spirits lifted, so that he whistled a merry jig to himself. A lark rose from a thicket to his left, soaring into the heavens, piping its own song. It was barely an hour before he saw the white cottage, with its patterned plasterwork on the walls, where most of the Villers family lived.

  Diligence was hoeing in the nearest field as he cantered up and John gave him a bright ‘good morrow’. The young Puritan was much of an age with John, but he had always seemed older, more solemn. He rose from his task and gave Ferris a slight bow.

  ‘Good morrow to thee, Brother Ferris. And may the blessings of the Good Lord Almighty go with thee on thy journey.’

  ‘I thank you, Diligence. Is Mistress Mary within?’

  ‘Nay. She has gone with our father to visit his sister who is sickly.’

  ‘Oh.’ John was disappointed, feeling the shadows of the earlier part of the morning crowding in on him once more. He had looked for reassurance from his beloved Mary, and now she was not here.

  ‘Will they return soon?’

  Diligence looked up at him, face unchanging. It was impossible to guess at what was going on behind the smooth cheeks and veiled eyes. Finally: ‘If soon be within the hour, I think not. If it be within the day, then I think they will.’

  Time was somewhat pressing. John had already made up his mind that he would try and return within two days rather than the three that he had

  originally planned on taking.

  ‘Tell her I called upon her.’

  ‘I will.’ A long pause. ‘Thee is going far, Captain Ferris?’

  ‘Captain no longer, Diligence. Yes, I go to see the market at Cambridge.’

  ‘Thee leaves thy father and mother?’

  ‘Of course I do. Should I not?’

  Diligence Villers shook his head at the question. Slow and solemn. ‘Nay. Doubtless the Lord Almighty will take them beneath his all-sheltering wings as with any orphans of the storms. I wish thee well, Master Ferris. A safe journey and a safe return.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  He moved on northwards, uneasy. First Joshua and now Diligence. Something wicked was afoot and he must take all care.

  As he rode he checked his sword came easily from its scabbard. And that his gun was ready in his broad belt. It was a Spanish pistol, made by Ripoll of Catalonia, and it was his pride and joy. He had picked. it up after a skirmish near Gainsborough, some eighteen months back. Lying near

  the corpse of an elegant Cavalier, headless in a ditch. The pistol had a miquelet lock and a distinctive ball butt. There was ornate silver chasing

  around the barrel, the lock and the butt, and the only damage had been the tip broken off the spur trigger. It was a fine gun—reliable and accurate.

  John had practised with it a great deal, improving his shaky marksmanship until he could safely hope to hit a man at forty paces.

  The ride to Cambridge was uneventful, the road mainly quiet.

  He passed a group of strolling players who shouted a cheery greeting, and a dozen silent monks, hooded, trudging stolidly on some mission of their own. A carriage bowled past him at speed, nearly forcing him into the hedge, and there was the glimpse of a pale, pretty lady, holding a nosegay to her face against the dust and smell of the highway.

  The only other group of travellers during the morning were headed in the opposite direction from Ferris. A cart, wheels caked with mud and showing the signs of much hard use. Driven by a chubby woman in a stained skirt and a blouse, but lower at the bodice than John would have considered decent and proper. She was smoking a pipe, resting her feet up, showing a deal of white calf.

  ‘Good day, bonny lad!’ she called, leaning sideways and spitting into the road.

  ‘Good day, Ma’am,’ he replied, reining in to let the cart pass.

  ‘My, but you’re a stu
rdy fellow. If we were not on business I’d be cheered to set down and swive with you an hour or so.’

  Ferris was shocked at such brazen effrontery, deciding that the woman must be a whore, with probably more of her kind within the canvas

  cover of the wagon. So he was doubly shocked when the cover twitched aside and a middle-aged man peered out. His face was that of a clerk, with a trimmed beard and moustaches. For a moment John feared a trap, particularly when he saw three horsemen appear around the further bend of the road. Big men, on spavined nags. From the curls to their hair, he guessed they were probably of the gipsy persuasion.

  ‘Hold your vile tongue, Liza Hall, or I shall dismiss you from my service.’

  The woman stared down, glancing up and winking at John Ferris to show how seriously she took the threat. Yet the voice did have something of great menace to it. Quiet, and yet sibilant, like a snake moving across smooth ice. Nonetheless, it was the voice of an educated man.

  The three gipsies had all reined in, some thirty paces beyond the cart, spreading out a little. Thoughts of an ambush came to John and he was grateful for the weight of pistol and sword at his belt.

  ‘Good day to you, Sirrah,’ called the older man. ‘A fine morning it is.’

  ‘It is indeed.’

  The exchange was formal and polite, with no scent of danger to it. And afterwards John Ferris went on his way, heading for Cambridge, leaving the gipsies and the small cart to go on in the opposite direction.

  The only question the clerkly man had asked him before they went their separate ways was how far it was to the town of Hertford.

  For a mile or so John Ferris wondered what such an ill-assorted quintet would be doing in Hertford, but the sun was shining and the road clear and he soon put the thought from his mind.

  CHAPTER SIX

  It was a sore disappointment to John Ferris to see how the great war was depleting the land. The market at Cambridge would once have been a busy, bustling affair, filled with farmers and peddlers, hucksters and acrobats, all intent on trading and having a good time. Now it was a bleak and sorry place.

  There was one small troupe of actors putting on a morality play from the tail of a wagon, to a crowd so sparse that a collection would not have bought clogs for a legless man.

  And the livestock. Some of it in such a miserable state that it was hardly alive enough to qualify for the name. A couple of dozen horses and mules, most looking as though the loading of a single pannier would bring them to their scarred knees. And the sheep and cattle were little better.

  Poor creatures, their owners demanding inflated prices for them.

  John chose to spend nothing of his inheritance at the market, deciding that he would dci better to purchase the farm he wanted and then go about

  stocking it at his convenience, using local stock whenever it was possible. So for the time being, the thousand guineas in gold would remain safely tucked away at home.

  Doctor Thomas Ferris was a careful, untrusting man when it came to money. Using his own skill and labour he had carefully built an iron strong box into the wall of the main parlour. Concealing it behind a dull oil-painting of some oysters and a bunch of dark purple flowers set on a table. Apart from himself and his wife, only John and Joshua Lightlantern knew of the existence of the hiding place. And the family knew that Joshua was totally to be trusted.

  His thoughts turned to the iron box as he rode back on the Hertford road from Cambridge the next morning. Recalling that there was one other person who knew where the money was safely hid.

  ‘Mary,’ he said, smiling to himself as he thought of her beauty. Surely the most lovely girl in all of Hertfordshire. ‘Nay, in all of England,’ he added. And within a very few weeks she would be Mary Ferris, his wife.

  She knew about the safe. One evening, when his parents had gone early to their beds, he had sat in their parlour with Mary. Perhaps ‘sat’ was not quite the word that he sought. She’d been up to her usual sportive tricks Tempting him by touching him through his breeches. Lifting up her skirts.

  ‘See, dearest. I wear no underpinnings so that I am ready for you.’

  ‘My parents,’ he’d protested.

  ‘Pish to them.’

  ‘But there will be . . .‘

  All along he’d wanted to do it. Wanted to lay her down on their best carpet and make violent love to her. Regardless of whether the Pope and

  the Archbishop of Canterbury should both be in the room. And now that they had set a date. . . .

  ‘My fortress is open and ready for the ravaging soldiers to invade it. Storm it. Do what you will.’

  So he had. Their coupling had been as ferocious and fiery as ever. By the sheerest fortune his mother had happened to come down the stairs just after they had finished. It was an easy matter for Mary to drop her skirts and sit demure by the fire, while he hastily buckled himself together, suddenly noticing a damp and sticky patch on their carpet, which he was able to cover with his boot. Ruth Ferris had noticed how flushed they both were and had suggested they move a little further from the hearth.

  It had been after that.

  Mary had started to talk about their plans for the farm and for the future. Urging him to begin to look for a place as soon as possible, chattering on about the new clothes that she would need as befitted the wife of a leading owner of land.

  ‘The money is safe, is it not, my brave lover?’ Mary had asked him. Nodding when he said it was well hid. Then pressing him to tell her.

  Though he refused her at first she wore him down by pestering him. Using her fingers on him and then her soft, warm lips, until he would have told

  her anything.

  But Mary was totally to be trusted. It was a great reassurance to John to think that.

  He had left Cambridge after a leisurely breaking of the night’s fast. The inn had a groaning board awaiting all its guests and John Ferris proved himself a sturdy trencherman. Tucking first into some smoked gammon with a brace of eggs. Then there was some mackerel, served with bacon and some new-baked bread. The landlord offered him special mulled claret to take the chill off the morning, which simply sharpened up his appetite once more and sent him back to the table for a bowl of scalding vegetable soup.

  While in the city he spent a while looking around at the shops. Trying to find something for his mother and father, finally settling on a pair of pewter tankards, one large and one small, that would be ideal for the quiet evenings when they all sat together and drank ale, united as a family.

  By the time he set Morgana’s nose in the direction of Hertford and the south, it was close to eleven in the morning. And he realised that he would have to press on at a good pace if he was to reach home before dark o’ertook him. And his worries over any threats to his parents made him eager to return within the two days he had set for himself.

  It had rained during the night and the track was muddy, pot-holes filled with rain that made the journey treacherous. Morgana was a great-hearted, sure-footed beast, but even with the best will John was aware that time was slipping by him at a great rate.

  Though he made no stop for a midday break, it was closing in on five in the afternoon and still nine miles to go. More rain threatened and the sky lowered down making night seem all the closer.

  The road dipped down into a hollow, between two stands of oaks. A swollen stream gurgled under a stone bridge that carried the path. As he came down into the dip John caught the odour of a wood fire, somewhere among the trees to his right. Travellers seemed all to have given best to the evening and he had seen nobody for the better part of a half hour.

  They came clopping into the gloom at the bottom of the dip, close to the narrow bridge, when the mare stopped. Digging in her heels and refusing to move. Head shaking, pawing at the muddy road.

  ‘Come on! On, damn you!’ He raised his hand, about to give the horse a stinging slap on the rump, when he saw movement among the trees. There were men there.

  ‘I see,’ he said, quietl
y to himself. That was why Morgana had stopped, scenting trouble. Casually Ferris stood in the stirrups as though he was

  stretching his muscles, glancing around behind him. As he’d feared there were two dark figures there, cloaked and caped.

  ‘Easy, Captain,’ came a voice from ahead.

  ‘Who goes there?’ he replied, throwing back his own cloak so that he could draw easily at either sword or pistol, depending on what was needful.

  A group of men who came out of dark woods at evening against a lone traveller were not likely to have a peaceful discourse on their minds.

  Four of them. Six, counting the two at the rear. With the possibility that there might be more of the rogues skulking among the dank oaks. The

  light was so poor that it was difficult to see whether or not any of them carried pistols. If they were peasant ruffians it wasn’t likely that they

  would be so armed with guns. More likely with cudgels, and perhaps a stolen sword or two between them. More than likely they would all carry daggers of some kind.

  ‘I asked who goes there?’ he repeated.

  ‘You be a soldier, Master?’

  ‘Yes. I am a Captain.’

  ‘For which side, Master?’ came another voice.

  ‘For the true side, fellow.’

  There was a general murmur of assent at that reply. The four were now grouped closely together, just on the far side of the bridge, while the other two were coming nearer. Perhaps forty paces off.

  ‘I asked who you were and what your business was? Footpads, are you?’ There was no point in backing off from them. Show the least sign of fear

  and the dogs would be at your throat. John Ferris knew that right well.

  ‘Footpads, Captain! Cruel words for us old soldiers fallen on evil times.’

  ‘Soldiers. From what army?’

  His right hand rested on the butt of the pistol. He had already picked out the leader as being the one with a large hat, several sizes too grand,

  hanging upon his ears. There was a temptation to ride at them, but if they chose to fight they would bring Morgana down in the mud and he would be lost. Better by far to remain mounted and hope to cut them away from him before they could engage him too closely and crowd his sword arm.