A Crowning Mercy (29 page)

'Your Ladyship's expecting an attack from a church choir, perhaps? They'll be soldiers, ma'am, soldiers! Fortifications!' And he had walked away, leaving Lady Margaret speechless, and the castle trembling as to which would win the battle of wills.

Yet Colonel Washington was not a successful soldier for nothing. He knew which battles to fight, and when to call for a truce, and once he had surveyed the defences, and once his one hundred and fifty men were settled into the keep, gatehouse and Old House, he made his peace with Lady Margaret. He skilfully sought her advice and, just as skilfully, planted his own ideas into her head so she would think them her own. Thus the last months of the old year had been peaceable enough. The colonel and his twelve officers ate with the family and, after two months, the officers even gave up their siege of Campion.

Yet the first day of 1644 brought a new excitement to the castle. The murderers came. Murderers and sakers.

They had been expected since early February, but the snow of the hard winter had kept them in Oxford, and even now the roads were so deep in mud that Colonel Washington had been surprised that they had arrived safely.

Caroline brought the news to the long gallery. 'They're here! They're here! They've arrived!'

Lady Margaret looked up from the half-bound book that somehow would not come right. 'Who's here? You sound as if it's the Second Coming! I heard no trump.'

'The murderers, mother! They're here!'

The book was instantly forgotten. 'Campion! My cloak. Your own too, child. Do hurry! I need boots. Caroline, find me boots. Come along! Come along!'

The murderers were at the front of the Old House, brought in wagons and escorted by thirty men who would be valuable additions to the garrison. Colonel Washington beamed at the wagons. 'Aren't they just splendid, Lady Margaret? Just splendid!'

'I wish to try one, instantly!'

Washington suppressed a smile. He had known that as soon as the cannons arrived Lady Margaret would want to play with one of them. He half bowed. 'I thought the honour of the first shot should belong to your Ladyship.'

'How very kind, Colonel.'

Oxford had been generous. They had sent four sakers, big guns, and six of the smaller murderers, though only the latter had been promised. The murderers were mounted on swivels and got their name because the recoil could swing the iron barrels round and kill the men who served the guns. The sakers fired round shot, while the smaller guns blasted out a dreadful fan of bullets and scrap metal that Colonel Washington said could scour a great swathe in an attacking enemy.

Campion watched as one of the big saker barrels was winched slowly on to a wooden carriage. It frightened her. She thought of Toby and she imagined his body caught by one of the great balls, mangled to pulp, and the sight of the assembled guns reminded her that the clouds of war, that had seemed so far away last year, were now closing in on Lazen. Colonel Washington, who was kind to her, thought that she worried needlessly. 'They've bigger fish to catch than us, Miss Campion. They'll try to capture Corfe Castle first. Besides, I'm keeping them on their toes.' The Colonel had started a vigorous campaign of patrols and raids, encouraging the enemy to stay away from Lazen.

Lady Margaret could scarce contain her impatience. She wanted to fire a murderer, the name appealing to her, but Washington tactfully pointed out that the saker was a bigger gun and would make a bigger bang. Lady Margaret agreed to fire a saker. She watched closely as powder was thrust into the hooped barrel, as the wadding was pushed down and finally as the iron ball was rolled into the muzzle and rammed down. A gunner sprinkled fine powder on the touch-hole and then Colonel Washington ordered everyone to stand clear. The gun faced west, across the moat towards the water meadows that had flooded in the winter.

Colonel Washington lit a linstock from the bowl of his pipe and handed the fire-tipped wand to Lady Margaret. 'Stand well clear of the wheels, Lady Margaret.'

She made a caustic comment to the effect that her father had been firing cannons when Colonel Washington was sucking milk, and then she walked with confidence to the ornate, square-breeched gun. She looked about her, at the soldiers, at Campion and Caroline and at her household servants. The linstock smoked. She poised it dramatically above the touch-hole. 'For King Charles!' She lowered the fire.

Lady Margaret squealed in alarm, a squeal that, luckily for her, was drowned by the saker's bellow. It hammered back on its heavy trail, its wheels bucking off the gravel, and Campion watched, appalled, as a cloud of filthy smoke billowed and rolled across the lily pads on the moat. The round shot landed in a water meadow, bounced in a silver haze of spray, bounced again, then slammed into a pollarded willow far down the valley.

'Magnificent!' Lady Margaret held the linstock like a sceptre. 'Let them come!'

'Give me more guns if they do.' Colonel Washington said the words quietly, but Campion heard him.

Lady Margaret stalked towards the colonel. 'Is my technique right, Colonel? Another attempt, perhaps?'

Colonel Washington hastened to assure her Ladyship that her gunnery was magnificent, as fine as any he had seen, and that much as he would like to see her demonstrate her prowess again, he had to confess that powder and shot were both scarce and expensive. Lady Margaret gracefully accepted the title of Honorary Gunner to Lazen Castle, as she was already an Honorary Musketeer and Honorary Engineer. It had been only with the greatest difficulty that Colonel Washington had dissuaded her from hacking with a sword at the butts he had erected in the Glebe Field.

Two weeks later in April the war did come to Lazen, though in a manner surprising to Campion. It was all so different from her expectations.

Colonel Washington had led most of his men north, tempted by a convoy of powder wagons that was rumoured to be going westward, and in his absence the Roundhead troops raided the Lazen valley. Lady Margaret, despite a parting admonition from Colonel Washington that she was to do nothing rash in his absence, rammed a ball into her musketoon.

Campion watched beside Lady Margaret from the long gallery. 'They're not doing very much.'

'They're cowards, dear.'

The enemy, wary perhaps of the soldiers left behind by Colonel Washington, had come no closer to the castle than the outskirts of Lazen village. The villagers, possessions on their backs and household animals led by ropes, trooped miserably towards the safety of the castle.

For a long time it seemed as though the Roundheads would do nothing. They waited around the watermill, staring at the castle, and then, after a half hour or so, some of them cantered westward into the valley fields. They were dressed just like the Royalists: leather jerkins, some with a breastplate strapped on top, and tall boots that were turned over above the knee. Their helmets had a flap at the back to protect their necks, and bars in front beneath the peak to stop a sword-cut to the eyes. The only difference Campion could see was that these men, the enemy, wore red or orange sashes about their waists, denoting their allegiance, while Lazen's defenders wore sashes of white or blue. Captain Tugwell, left in command for the day, lined his musketeers along the moat, each man thrusting a forked musket-rest into the soft lawn on which they could support the heavy musket barrels.

The Roundheads were not interested in the castle, only in its cattle. They herded what cows they could find, driving them back to the mill, and Lady Margaret frowned because no enemy trooper had come within range of the shrunken garrison's firearms. After watching for an hour she was resigned to the raid. 'We'll just have to take some of theirs. Oh, good! They've taken that very ill-tempered brindle cow. I don't understand why we kept it alive over the winter.'

An hour later the Roundheads began to withdraw and there followed what, to Campion, was an extraordinary incident. A single man rode slowly towards the castle moat, his hands spread wide to show he meant no harm. He was dressed superbly. Instead of a helmet he wore a wide, velvet hat from which flowed an extravagant plume. His breastplate, shining as if it was silver, was strapped over a scarlet jacket. His tall boots were an improbable white, stained with mud, but impressively impractical. Captain Tugwell ordered his men not to shoot, and Lady Margaret, peering from one of the long gallery's windows, suddenly smiled. 'Sweet Lord! It's Harry! Come, child!'

As she hurried Campion downstairs and into the garden, Lady Margaret explained who 'Harry' was. 'Lord Atheldene, dear. A very charming man. I always thought he'd be quite perfect for Anne, but she had to marry that bore Fleet.' She stopped at the edge of the moat. 'Harry!'

Lord Atheldene swept his hat from his head. 'Dear Lady Margaret.'

'How are you, Harry?'

'Busy. I do apologise for all this.'

'Don't be foolish, Harry. We shall simply take them back from you. I suppose my son-in-law ordered it?'

Atheldene smiled. He was a handsome man, Campion guessed in his early thirties, who wore his blond hair long and curled. 'He did, Lady Margaret. I fear he dare not show favouritism to you.'

'I notice he didn't dare come himself. How's that girl you married?'

'Very pregnant.' Atheldene smiled. 'Sir George? Is he well?'

'So far as he tells me. He's in Oxford. You can tell my son-in-law that he's attacking defenceless women.'

Atheldene glanced at Lazen's soldiers, smiled, but did not give Lady Margaret a rejoinder. She sniffed. 'I'm sorry to see you fighting against your King, Harry.'

'Only against his advisers. Lady Margaret.'

'You're cavilling, Harry!'

Again he did not accept the challenge. He turned his charm on to Campion. 'I don't believe we've been introduced.'

Lady Margaret answered, 'Nor will you be. She's much too young to meet traitors.'

They exchanged family news, local gossip, and then Atheldene bowed low from his saddle and turned his horse. He waved a hand in salute of Captain Tugwell's courtesy in not firing and then spurred his horse towards the village.

The incident puzzled Campion. She had an idea of the King's enemies as men like her father, stern Puritans, dull-dressed and crop-haired, and it was difficult to imagine how a charming, elegant, polished nobleman like Lord Atheldene should be in their ranks. Lady Margaret explained. 'The King's an extremely foolish man, dear. He's quite charming on two days of the year, but the rest of the time he's exceedingly dull and pig-headed beyond belief. Every time he wanted money he invented a new reason. It wouldn't do. He almost bled us dry, and he certainly wrung a fortune out of Harry. There were taxes here, taxes there, and when the taxes wouldn't do he demanded loans that will never be repaid. Then he tried to do without Parliament and the English don't like that. They like Parliament. It gives men like George something to do. I'm not at all surprised that so many good men rebelled.'

Campion was amused by this sudden reversion of Lady Margaret's normally belligerent partisanship. 'Then why did you choose the King's side?'

'Me, dear? None of my family has ever been a rebel, and I do not intend to be the first.' They were back in the long gallery and Lady Margaret stared ruefully at a book in a frame that was supposed to help her sew its pages together. She was not having great success with book-binding. 'Besides, the King is the King, even if he is a fool. It's not just that.' She frowned. 'Ever since this rebellion started horrible things have been crawling out from every dark corner. I do not wish to be ruled by Baptists, Anabaptists, or anyone else! They'll demand I take a bath and call it religion!' She shook her head. 'In truth, dear, I wish this war had never come. If Queen Elizabeth had been sensible and bred a son, we wouldn't have these wretched Scots on our throne. We have to have a king, but why he has to be Scottish is beyond me.' She picked up her unfired musketoon and looked at it wistfully. 'Perhaps I can shoot a rabbit.'

It was all so complicated. Some of the nobles had sided with Parliament, while some of the Commons had sided with the King. The King was Scottish, yet the Scottish nation, that acknowledged Charles as their King just as he was King of England, had sent an army against their monarch. Some said the war was fought against the King's illegal taxation, others said it was fought to stop Parliament taking power that was properly the King's, while many believed it to be truly a war about what kind of religion should be imposed on England. Neighbour fought neighbour, father fought son, and soldiers captured in battle cheerfully changed sides to avoid imprisonment.

Colonel Washington, with whom Campion spoke that evening and who had fought in the religious wars of northern Europe, was sanguine about the fighting. 'It's not a bad war, Miss Campion. There's no real nastiness.'

'Nastiness?' Campion asked.

He looked sideways at her, stroking his small moustache. There's not a lot of hatred in it. Oh, we're fighting, and men are dying, but we're not seeing what we saw in Germany.' He shook his head. 'I've seen them slaughter whole towns. Not pretty, not pretty!' He stared into his tankard of ale. 'Mind you, if it goes on too long then it could turn very bloody. Very bloody indeed.' He swallowed his ale. 'I'm to bed, my dear, and I suppose you're not going to make an old man happy tonight?'

She laughed. It was becoming an old, familiar joke. Colonel Washington, in some ways, had replaced Sir George in the life of the castle.

Sir George Lazender was at Oxford where the King had summoned his parliament. Its members, meeting in the hall of Christ Church, were all members of the old Parliament who had stayed loyal to the King, and Sir George had gone even though he knew that this Oxford 'Parliament' had no power and was merely a device to give the King's decrees an appearance of legality. He had gone too, Lady Margaret suspected, because he wanted to haunt the libraries of the university, and because he missed the political gossip denied him by his banishment from Westminster.

Sir George wrote early in April suggesting that, if Colonel Washington could spare an escort, Campion should visit Oxford in May. There were doctors and lawyers available, a church court convened, and Campion could annul her marriage to Samuel Scammell. She was embarrassed at the need to prove her virginity, but she would do it.