Alice in Love and War (5 page)

“You might as well get used to walking,” said Mistress Erlam, who wore big leather boots, like a man. “We keep the wagon space for those who can’t.” She looked narrowly at Alice. “Run away from home, have you? Taken a fancy to young Robin?”

“He was billeted on the farm.”

“Ah. Well, you’ve netted yourself a proper man there. He’s a charmer, is Robin. Always popular with the girls.”

Alice was silent. She didn’t like that “always”. And she thought, He’ll make me jealous. She was jealous already, of women he had not yet met. What have I done? she wondered. Can I trust him? Well, it was too late now.

Mistress Erlam, it seemed, was a wagon master’s wife. She always travelled with her husband. Their dog, a scruffy, friendly mongrel, ran beside her. The train was her life, she said, and Alice saw that she had made herself indispensable. She oversaw the packing of much of the baggage, and took it upon herself to keep an eye on the groups of younger women and everything that went on in the train, and to give out advice.

“You need to tuck your hair away and keep your bosom covered,” she told Alice. “There are some rough men in the ranks: convicts, imbeciles, beggars; they scoop up the dregs, take anyone, to fill their quota of conscripts. And some of the officers are not much better. You must have heard about Prince Rupert’s men?”

Alice had heard. She remembered stories of how Prince Rupert’s army had fallen upon a little Puritan town called Birmingham, where the people were metalworkers and made swords for Parliament. They had brought terror to that place: robbing, killing, dishonouring the women; and setting houses and workshops ablaze as they left.

“I’ll have to get you a hat and some breeches,” Mistress Erlam went on.

Alice, who’d been half listening to all her talk, was startled, and stared. Had she heard aright?

The older woman laughed. “It’s often the safest way to dress, believe me. We all do it on occasion. Much safer to be taken for a man if you’re away from the train, out foraging in the countryside.”

Foraging. Alice hadn’t thought about food, beyond the bit of bread and cheese she’d brought with her from the farm. She hadn’t thought about much at all, except Robin, and love, and escape. How would she live? Would she need money? She’d supposed Robin would take care of her.

Her companion glanced at her and clicked her teeth. “I don’t know what Robin was thinking of, bringing a young lass like you along. How old are you? Sixteen? Seventeen? The train’s no place for such as you.”

Alice said nothing. She was indeed frightened and amazed at what she had done – and it was I who did it, she thought, not Robin – and yet she would not for anything go back. She had escaped. The rain of the past week had blown itself out, and the day was mild, with blue sky showing. As they walked the track across country, skirting the edge of the moor and passing a few farmhouses and hamlets, she looked about her and breathed deeply and felt a great upsurge of freedom such as she had never experienced before. She was herself, in charge of her own destiny. Already she was seeing new places. The track led them along the edge of a deep wooded gorge where a waterfall plunged with a great rushing roar onto the rocky riverbed far below; and from there they came over a high bridge into a town with a castle on a steep spur – a place she suddenly recognized as one she used to see in the distance from the top of the tor – and then out again onto hilly land with farms here and there; and always the high open moor stretching up on their right.

In the late morning people began to bring out food from their packs. Alice finished most of her bread and cheese and drank small beer from a leather bottle. She wondered what she would eat in the evening; whether she’d share food with Robin; where it would come from. None of the women took any notice of her, so she stayed close to Mistress Erlam. Then Master Erlam joined them, and he and his wife talked of army matters together, and Alice sat alone, looking around her and thinking about Robin.

It was late afternoon when they reached the outskirts of Okehampton: a fair-sized town, though not as big as Tavistock.

“The king and his gentlemen will stay in town,” said Mistress Erlam. “The army moves on.”

“How much further?” Alice was tired. Her feet felt tender from walking along so many steep stony paths.

“About another five miles, I heard.”

“Five miles!”

The woman smiled. “The last few miles are always the longest.”

They were. Alice felt an ache spreading through her legs and hips as they trudged uphill and then along endless narrow lanes, past fields and farms that all looked the same. But at last Mistress Erlam pointed out to her a church steeple and what might have been a castle, and they entered some fields on the edge of a small town and the wagons circled round and stopped. Alice sank down on the muddy grass and thought she would never have the strength to rise again.

But then she saw Robin coming towards her. Mistress Erlam laughed as she sprang up and ran to meet him.

Robin caught and held her close, and she clung to him and felt tears start to her eyes; she hadn’t realized till then how lonely she had felt, among strangers all day.

“Are you tired, sweet?” he asked. “Hungry?”

She nodded, not trusting herself to speak.

“We’ll go into the town.”

They walked with their arms around each other. Most of the soldiers, except those left to guard the wagons, were heading into town. The Erlams were setting up a hearth for cooking. Alice supposed they lived in their wagon. It looked comfortable enough with its covered frame, the dog sitting up there watching all the coming and going. She waved to Mistress Erlam, then turned towards Robin as he led her away.

The quartermasters had evidently been into town ahead of the army and requisitioned billets. Many of the inhabitants were watching from doorways and windows; others had closed their shutters and presented a blank, unfriendly face to those they saw as invaders.

There were about a dozen men in Robin’s charge. He led his group through the town, towards some cottages that straggled along a lane heading out to the fields on the other side. Alice knew the officers would have filled the town billets, leaving the common soldiers to lie in whatever lofts, barns or stables could be found near by. Robin banged on several doors – farm labourers’ homes, Alice guessed – placing two or three men at each cottage and handing a payment voucher to the householder.

Now there were only three other men remaining with him and Alice.

“We’ll stop here,” he said, approaching the last cottage.

The door was opened by a thin woman with children clinging to her skirts. Both woman and children backed away as the men strode in. Alice felt herself being observed in a way she had never experienced before. A whore, the woman’s glance said; we must endure not only the Cavaliers but their whores. Alice could not meet her eye.

A girl of about ten years old was putting a meal on the table: cheese, bread, onions and some small beer. Alice saw the food and felt weak with hunger. But Robin demanded to see the sleeping quarters. The woman showed him the only bed: a box bed in the single room that she shared with the younger children. The men could sleep by the fire, she said; there were mats, and they could have the straw-stuffed pillows from the bed.

Robin turned to look at a ladder leading up to a hatch in the ceiling. “What’s up there?”

“A loft. It’s small, low. The older boys sleep there.”

“Turn them out,” said Robin. He glanced at Alice. “We’ll have it.”

Alice felt herself reddening and looked at the floor.

The woman and children watched them as they ate. Alice wondered if the family had eaten, or if this was all they had. Their obvious poverty, and the imposition of the army’s sudden demands, took away her own appetite, and although she was hungry she could not eat much. But she was thirsty and drank more beer than she was accustomed to.

“My husband died in the wars,” the woman said. “They were quartered in the field in bad weather and he froze to death overnight. His comrade told me.” She was holding the youngest child – pale, with blue shadows under its eyes – on her hip. “I have no way to live now.”

Robin glanced at the food – he was eating heartily – and said, “A quartermaster will pay you later for our food and keep. Give him the voucher I wrote for you.”

“The voucher…” The woman took out the piece of paper from a pocket under her skirt and looked at it, bemused, as if willing it to turn into coin.

“It will be redeemed,” said Robin. He did not say when.

“I have nothing, sir. Nothing to live on.”

“Don’t fear. It
will
be redeemed, and soon.” He touched her elbow. “I’ll see to it myself.”

The woman’s face softened, and she smiled. “Oh, thank you, sir. You are good.”

She believes him, Alice thought; she trusts him to help her. Yet what could he do? The Royalist armies, in particular, were notorious for not paying up. And if the army did not have the money, how could he see to it that she was paid?

But the woman looked happier now, and sent the eldest girl out to draw water for washing; and Robin encouraged Alice to eat.

As soon as it began to get dark everyone went to bed. The three men had the mats by the fire; the boys squeezed into the box bed with the rest of the children.

The woman took a chamber pot and a pillow up to the loft. She came down apologizing. “It’s small, sir. And the boys…”

“No matter,” said Robin.

Alice went up ahead of him. The loft was low and dark, the straw not very fresh. An unpleasant smell came from the far corner. Either the boys had overshot the chamber pot or they hadn’t been using one. Robin made a sound of disgust at the stink, and cursed when he banged his head on a beam. Even Alice could not stand upright.

Robin laughed. “Oh, Alice!” His arms went around her, and he drew her down beside him on the straw. “I’ve had worse lodgings,” he said.

She felt his lips warm on hers, his hands under her shift. This time there was no hurry, and she felt relaxed; a little drunk, she supposed. She responded ardently to his kisses, and as they began to make love she wanted to lose herself entirely to the moment; but all the time she was aware of the open hatch near by and the men lying below. She hoped they were asleep, but feared they might be listening.

“Don’t think of them,” said Robin.

And later, when they lay still, their hearts beating fast and arms wrapped around each other, she forgot them, and was happy. She fell asleep, curled against Robin for warmth.

She woke early. There were sparrows in the thatch, and patches of light where the roof needed renewing. She was lying close to Robin, her right arm partly under him. The arm was numb, but she didn’t want to move. She studied his face as the light brightened. It looked soft in sleep, younger. His eyelashes lay like dark fans on his cheeks. She gazed at the line of his cheekbone, his roughly cut moustache and beard, the hollow of his throat.

I love him, she thought. And the thought was both a pleasure and a pain, for she saw how desirable he was; how other women must envy her.

His eyes opened. He smiled at her and said, “Good morning, sweet.”

And then he stretched and stood up and went to use the chamber pot. Alice thought the sound would wake the dead. It certainly alerted those below. She heard voices, and caught the words “…now those two lovebirds be up and pissing…” She moved her numb arm; prickles of pain ran all along it.

Robin, stooping under the beams, pulled on his stockings and breeches. “Crediton today,” he said. “And from there they are saying the king will ride in state to Exeter.”

Five

Perhaps
we’ll be married in Exeter, Alice thought. She knew Exeter was a great city, and if the king was to arrive there in state then surely he would stay more than a night? She and Robin would have time together; time to find a priest.

There had been little enough time that morning after they left the cottage. Robin and the other men had gone off to rejoin their company, and she had walked back alone to the baggage train, where there was an air of comradeship among those who had slept in tents and shelters overnight and who were now stamping out their fires and packing up. She saw groups of women chatting, combing their hair, gathering their belongings. She also noticed how few had children with them.

They know what to do, she thought. She knew a little herself, from studying her father’s book and from listening to Jenefer and Sarah. Mint leaves were good: a bunch pushed well up. Or fern, which might be readier to hand on moorland. Not that she’d done anything about it at all, yet. Some part of her didn’t want to; wanted everything to be unspoiled, perfect, like Adam and Eve.

She’d felt a heaviness in her lower back and thighs all day yesterday, and had put it down to the unaccustomed walking. But it was not that. She recognized it now. Sure enough, when she went into the bushes to relieve herself, she found spots of blood on her shift. The slight anxiety that had hung over her ever since that first time with Robin instantly lifted. She had brought rags in her hessian bag. But how would she wash them, she wondered, while on the move like this? She would have to watch what others did.

She emerged from the bushes and went back to the camp, passing the artillery wagons, where some soldiers called out to her with lewd comments. She felt lonely and unsafe. There was no sign of Mistress Erlam; and in any case she felt she could not trail in the older woman’s wake for ever. There were women here nearer her age, but they all seemed to have their own groups and friendships. Some of them talked in foreign languages or strange accents, making her feel even more shut out. As the train began to move off, she walked by herself, on the fringe of one of the groups.

It was not long before a soldier started to bother her, one of those who guarded the train.

“All alone, are you? Want some company?”

He was a lanky fellow with a cocksure, pimply face. She did not like his looks or his conversation, and quickened her pace, trying to shake him off.