Flood (The Fenland Series Book 1)

by Ann Swinfen

  My attention was caught by the final blessing, and we shuffled to our feet. Little Huw had remained docile in his mother’s arms all through the service and I hoped he would maintain his good behaviour during the christening, though they do say that a child ought to cry when the baptismal water touches him. It is supposed to let out the Devil. I could not believe there was any Devil in that beautiful child.

  Most of the congregation was leaving, bowing and exchanging a few words with Gideon at the door. They would finish the preparations for our merry-making while a small party remained behind for the christening – the Cox family (Mistress Cox leaning on her husband’s arm, he on a stout stick) and the three godparents: Toby Ashford, Tom and I. We gathered around the font, which was near the door of the church. A crudely hollowed stone, roughly circular, it was very ancient. Gideon thought it might even date from before the time that the Saxons converted to Christianity. There were strange carvings so old and rubbed that it was difficult to make them out, though with the tip of my finger I had once traced a horseman and something that might have been a mirror or a horse-collar. Later carvers had added Christian symbols, the Chi Rho and a cross with four equal arms. Someone had started to carve an inscription ‘Deus no…’ but had abandoned the hard granite. The stone itself was unusual, for we do not find granite around these parts.

  Alice handed Huw to me and again he curled himself into my shoulder as Gideon, shining in a white surplice, began the baptismal services, holding Queen Elizabeth’s Prayer Book open before him.

  Wilt thou then obediently keep God’s holy will and commandments, and walk in the same all the days of thy life?

  Tom, Toby and I as godparents answered, I will.

  When I handed the baby to Gideon, I thought I could hear the distant sound of galloping hoofs, but told myself it was my imagination. Who would be galloping through the village on a summer Sunday morning? The sound seemed to be coming from the direction of the manor, but onwards from here the road led nowhere except to our farm and the Fens.

  We receive this Child into the congregation of Christ’s flock, and do sign him with the sign of the Cross, in token that hereafter he shall not be ashamed to confess the faith of Christ crucified, and manfully to fight under his banner, against sin, the world, and the devil; and to continue Christ’s faithful soldier and servant unto his life’s end. Amen.

  As Gideon was anointing Huw’s head with the water from the font, his eyes sprang open in surprise and I saw that they were a deep blue. He did not cry out, but gurgled in pleasure and waved his fists in Gideon’s face. Then I realised the very moment when Gideon also heard the horses. We looked at each other in alarm as he spoke the thanksgiving:

  We yield thee most hearty thanks, most merciful Father, that it hath pleased thee to regenerate this Infant with thy holy Spirit . . .

  When he handed the baby back to me, everyone heard the disturbance. The horses were right outside. Men were shouting. There was a clatter as the horses pulled up, a jingle of harness, then the church door burst open and a dozen soldiers of the Model Army, carrying muskets and wearing armour, poured into the church.

  We all shrank back, all except Gideon who stood unmoved beside the font, the Prayer Book in his hand.

  ‘What evil papist practices are these?’ A heavy-built man, clearly in command, strode towards us, pointing his musket at Gideon.

  ‘Nothing but the baptism of a babe,’ said Gideon mildly, ‘according to the word of the English Church.’

  The man, a captain, grabbed the book. ‘This!’ He waved it in the air. ‘This Romish witchcraft is banned, as well you know, priest.’

  He leaned his gun against the font and began to rip the pages from the book and throw them into the font. Gideon gave a cry and reached out to take the book back, but another soldier struck him across the face with the butt of his musket. Blood began to run down from his nose and stain the front of his surplice. Tom took a step forward, raising his fists, but at once several of the soldiers turned their guns on the three young men. The rest of us were clearly no threat. Mistress Cox had gone as white as milk and collapsed into the hindmost pew. Her husband, his legs trembling beneath him, sank down beside her. Alice had pressed her fist into her mouth to stop herself from crying out, but looked as though she might faint at any moment. I clutched Huw convulsively in my arms. The only one unmoved by the arrival of the soldiers, he held out his arms toward them.

  My heart pounding, I tried to step closer to Alice, so that she could see the baby was safe, but at my first movement the captain picked up his musket and pointed it at me.

  ‘Stay where you are!’ He nodded to two of the soldiers and pointed at the window beyond the altar. ‘Deal with that. And you! Tear down the rails and carry the altar outside for firewood.’

  The men hurried to do his bidding. There was the crash of breaking glass as they swung their muskets against the window of the Madonna and Child. A few fragments fell to the floor, others outside, but large sections were held in place by the lead-work. Nothing deterred, they continued to smash it until the lead buckled and the east end of the church was strewn with a litter of jewel-like fragments. Then they turned to help their fellows heave the heavy altar out through the door and to stamp on the delicate carving of the altar rails, until they joined the broken glass in an horrific mosaic of destruction.

  The captain swaggered up to the far end of the church and stirred the mess with the toe of his riding boot.

  ‘Good,’ he grunted. ‘One less church of Rome.’

  ‘We are not Catholics,’ Gideon protested, as he wiped his bloodied face with the sleeve of his surplice. ‘We are true to the English Christian Church. The church established under our Sovereign Lady, Queen Elizabeth.’

  The captain walked back and stood over him.

  ‘There are no kings or queens in England now. You are filthy recusants who disobey the orders of the government. You have been ordered, you and all your fellows, to cease these superstitious practices.’

  He turned to the font, where the pages of the Prayer Book floated and then sank.

  ‘Holy water? Holy shit!’ He spat into the font. Then he unlaced his breeches and aimed an arc of piss into the baptismal water.

  ‘Help yourselves, boys. As good a pisspot as I’ve seen anywhere.’

  Laughing and making crude gestures, the other soldiers unlaced themselves and followed his example. Gideon threw himself forward, but was struck again and thrown to the ground, where he lay very still. Tom and Rafe both started toward the font, but were seized by the soldiers and pushed down to kneel on the ground with muskets to their heads. When Toby shouted out, he was forced to join them.

  While their attention was distracted, I began to ease my way towards Alice, who stood trembling, gripping the back of the pew where the Coxes sat, as though she would collapse if she let go.

  ‘Trooper Winter!’ said the captain, ‘fetch my horse!’

  What did they plan now? They had defiled the font and wrecked the church. Did they intend to turn it into a stable?

  One of the soldiers returned, leading a big bay stallion, who skittered sideways and rolled his eyes, frightened by the unfamiliar narrow spaces, and sensing the atmosphere of fear and loathing, as any intelligent animal will do. As he sidled away from the captain one of his rear hoofs came down hard on Gideon’s hand. I heard him cry out. At least he was still alive. I watched as he struggled to get to his feet, then fell back again. I began to shake and clutched the baby more tightly in my arms, afraid of dropping him.

  ‘Winter, give me your helmet.’

  The trooper obeyed, looking baffled, but then the captain used it to scoop up some of the befouled water from the font.

  ‘I baptise you Destrier,’ he said, in a mock-pious voice, ‘by the father, the son and the holy spirit, so help me, the Romish God and all his saints and angels and ghouls and hobgoblins.’

  He poured the helmetful of water over the horse’s head and the terrified animal backed awa
y, dragging his reins from the captain’s hand and rearing up. His front feet crashed down again, striking sparks from the stone floor, then he broke away and shot out of the door. The captain threw down the helmet.

  ‘Fetch him back,’ he said, and two of the soldiers ran out.

  ‘Now,’ he said, ‘it is time we taught this recusant priest what it means to disobey Cromwell.’

  I cannot speak of what happened next. I gave Huw back to Alice and buried my face in my hands. I could not look, but I could not stop myself hearing what they did to Gideon. At the sound of every blow, my stomach clenched. He was trying to keep silent, but his very body seemed to betray him into terrible, suppressed grunts. I raised my head for a moment and saw one of the soldiers raise a booted foot and kick him in the small of the back. Gideon’s body arched like a broken doll. Then I saw the captain draw his sword and bring it down on Gideon’s back. I clamped my arms over my head and a moan broke from my lips. At last everything was silent, except for the heavy breathing of the soldiers.

  ‘Right,’ said the captain. ‘The rest of you can go now. Out with you.’

  With the soldiers prodding us in the back with the barrels of their muskets, our pathetic little group was herded out to the village green. On the far side, guarded by more soldiers, the rest of the village had gathered, their faces stunned. One of the troopers was walking the captain’s horse up and down to calm him. A sodden page from the Prayer Book was lodged in his mane.

  As I stumbled into the sunlight, I saw that there was another mounted man with the soldiers. A man in elegant clothes which looked out of place amongst their buff coats.

  Edmund Dillingworth made me an ironic bow, and smiled.

  When the troopers and their informer had ridden away, people began to move slowly about, as if they walked in their sleep. Gideon had been left in the church. Dead or alive, we could not know, but I had to discover the truth and confront that horror in the church. I felt as cold as the ice-bound Fen in winter, and could not stop the shaking of my hands, but I found Kitty, keeping close to my mother and wide-eyed with fright.

  ‘Kitty, you must find Hannah for me. Tell her to come to the church. Master Clarke is badly hurt. Then go to Mistress Cox’s maid and ask for water and rags. Bring them to the church.’ I was surprised that my voice sounded almost normal, although it seemed to come from a long way away.

  She stood frozen, unable to move, so I gave her shoulder a shake.

  ‘Quickly, Kitty!’

  She ran off.

  Alice and Rafe had taken Huw home. Tom and Toby were huddled with the other young men of the village, talking together in low but angry voices. Had they all forgotten Gideon? Or was he already dead and I too stupefied to see it? Reluctantly I turned back to the church, afraid of what I might find there. The door was half wrenched off its hinges and the interior was unnaturally bright. Summer sunlight, untouched by what had happened here, flooded in from the doorway and the naked east window, where a few twists of lead and bits of coloured glass still dangled. I shaded my eyes against the light, and saw that the upper half of the hare swung in the breeze, as though he had hanged himself.

  Gideon was lying face down in a pool of blood beside the font, curled up with his arms around his head as if he had tried to protect himself. His surplice was ripped off, and his torn shirt revealed the sword slashes across his back. His hair was a mass of matted blood. One shoe lay on its side, his stocking half pulled down, as if he had been dragged along the floor by his feet. My stomach heaved as I knelt down beside him, my skirt soaking up the blood. He must be dead already. One of the sword cuts ran deep into his left side and blood was pouring from it. Some vague memory stirred in me. Did not the blood stop flowing once a man was dead?

  I reached out a shaking hand and felt beneath his ear. At first I could not tell whether I felt a pulse or whether it was the pounding of my own heart. Could it be that he still lived, despite these terrible injuries? A darkness rose around me and I knew that if Gideon were dead, something would die in me too. It burst on me with sudden clarity that this man was more to me than I had ever allowed myself to know. Surely there was a faint pulse there in his neck, no more than a faint flutter. Something fell on my hand and I realised that I was weeping. Angrily I brushed my eyes. This was no time for weakness.

  There was a pulse, I was sure of it. I remembered the hay field and Gideon lying back in the sun, his shirt open to reveal the steady beat of his heart.

  ‘Thank God,’ I whispered. ‘Thank God.’

  I looked up as Kitty crept through the door. She carried a pail of water and a bundle of rags.

  ‘Hannah is coming,’ she whispered. ‘The rector, is he dead?’

  ‘Not yet, I think. Before all else, I must bind up this great wound in his side. Give me the rags.’

  She crept a little nearer and set down the water and rags. Nervously she looked down at Gideon and gave a cry. ‘Oh, Mistress Mercy, surely he must be dead! How could they treat him so?’

  ‘They were savages,’ I said. ‘Help me to tear the cloth into strips.’

  We had made a length of bandage and I was trying to bind it around that terrible wound in Gideon’s side when Hannah arrived. Kitty had struggled, unable to lift him enough for me to pass the bandage around his chest, but between the two of them they eased him far enough off the floor for me to pass my arms under and around, until I could secure it tightly. Still the blood soaked the cloth at once.

  ‘I cannot stop the bleeding.’ I turned frantic eyes to Hannah. ‘What shall I do?’

  ‘We must bind his head as well,’ she said. Her calm voice steadied me. ‘Then we must have him carried home. All my salves and potions are there.’

  She ran her hand over his right arm, which I now saw was crooked at an unnatural angle. ‘I think his shoulder is dislocated too, but we cannot set it here.’

  ‘Kitty,’ I said, ‘run to Tom and tell him to find a litter – a sheep hurdle or a door – and some others of the men to help us carry Master Clarke to the farm. Quickly now. We must be quick.’

  I was sure that with every minute that passed, Gideon’s life was slipping away from me. Hannah gave me a sharp look as Kitty ran from the church.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said, not knowing why I was apologising. ‘I don’t know what . . .’

  She reached out across Gideon’s body and patted my hand.

  ‘We’ll take him home and care for him. The Lord looks after his own. Surely he will not allow this good man to die.’

  ‘He allowed many good men to die in the War,’ I said bitterly. ‘Aye, and women and children too.’

  I wished I had her faith. All I could hear ringing in my head was the sounds of the soldiers hacking at Gideon, and all I could see was Edmund Dillingworth, smiling upon his horse.

  Tom came, and half a dozen strong men, and they lifted Gideon on to a sheep hurdle. We had bound the bloody mess that was Gideon’s head, but his eyes were swollen shut. I could not even be sure that he still had eyes. Hannah told them to lay Gideon on his side, the side without the worst injury, and as we carried him out of the church, Alice came running with a blanket to lay over him. Her face was blotched with weeping.

  ‘I know it is a warm day,’ she said, ‘but he has been so badly hurt. He may be cold.’

  Her hands shook so much she could barely spread the blanket over him.

  ‘He did this for my Huw, and now he may die for it.’ She gave a great shuddering sob. ‘This my fault, mine and Rafe’s, for wanting proper baptism.’

  ‘Go back to Huw,’ I said, trying to sound calm. ‘We will carry Gideon to the farm. He did what he believed to be right. You must not take the blame on yourself or little Huw.’

  She nodded but stayed watching us until we passed round the bend in the lane, twisting her hands in her skirt, her face white and drawn.

  ‘Rafe,’ I said, for he was one of the bearers, ‘go back to Alice and see that she rests. She is still weak. I will take your place.’

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p; He nodded, clearly relieved, and gave up his place to me. I knew my poor strength could make little difference to the bearers, but I needed to be doing something.

  As we drew near the farm, I ran ahead to make ready Kitty’s bed, where we had nursed Nehemiah all those weeks ago. Then I stirred up the fire and put water on to boil. As the men lifted Gideon on to the bed, I climbed up to Hannah’s room in the attic to fetch down her satchel of medicines. I caught up some of the wax-stoppered bottles arranged along the windowsill, unsure of what she would need. Hannah could not write and marked the labels with symbols known only to her, but I thought I recognised one or two she had used on Nehemiah’s broken head.

  When I came into the little room and saw Gideon lying there, mangled and bloody and pale as death, I thought my heart had stopped in my body. He could not surely live.

  But Hannah was brisk, rolling up her sleeves and sending Kitty to bring the hot water. ‘We must strip him, Mercy, to see how bad is the damage. His shoulder will need to be set and that great wound in his side must be sewn up. I do not like the look of his eyes.’

  I shivered. I thought of Gideon’s great love of his books. He would rather spend his meagre stipend on books than on food. What if he were to live, but be blind? Would he thank us for saving him? I pushed the thought away. There might be little chance of saving him.