Devil Water (22 page)

Several miles from Dilston but still on Derwentwater land the Earl turned his horse away from the burn and struck out into rough hilly country north of Hexhamshire Common. “Can Forster find Greenriggs, d’you think?” James asked of Charles as they entered a purple waste of heather and began to look for the old farmhouse which was the landmark.

“If he doesn’t,” said Charles, “his head’s even thicker than I think it. I made him a map.”

“Brother,” James said reining in the stallion, and speaking sternly, “Tom Forster is our general. He’s received his commission from our King himself. You must remember this, obey his orders, and from now on speak of him with respect.”

“Aye, my lord,” said Charles after a moment. “Needs must, since I obey
you.
And there’s Forster now, on yonder hill!”

The new General, on a huge black horse, was easy to identify since he had dressed himself in a scarlet coat trimmed with gold braid and wore a general’s hat tufted with cock feathers. He carried a large green taffeta standard on which King James’s emblem was emblazoned. Forster had about twenty horsemen with him, and the two parties galloped to meet each other. “Thought ye’d never come, m’lord,” said Tom somewhat peevishly. “Began to think ye’d got cold feet again. No matter since ye’re here,” he added hastily, seeing both James and Charles stiffen. “There’s some officers for ye to meet. One ye already know -- that’s Colonel Oxburgh. I’ve made him me aide-de-camp.”

Henry Oxburgh came forward and bowed to James. “It does my heart good to see your lordship again, and Mr. Radcliffe. Our cause is mightily prospering in Scotland, I’ve much news for you. And may I present two young Irish officers who’ll ride with us? Captains Nicholas and Charles Wogan.”

The Irish brothers were startlingly young, both in their teens, but were already trained soldiers. They had twinkling eyes and a dashing gallantry.

“Now we’ll have a drop all around, afore we plan our march,” said Forster, struggling to reach the flask which was wedged between his rump and coattails.

“May I speak with my Lord Derwentwater?” murmured a meek oily voice, at Tom’s elbow. “I’d like his lordship to know I’ve joined the Rising.”

“Begock!” said Tom. “I forgot ye, Patten!” He shoved forward a meager man with a knobbly head and a sharp nose, who wore the black suit and round collar of an Episcopal curate. “Robert Patten from Allendale,” said Tom carelessly. “Wants to be me chaplain.”

“Yes, I know Mr. Patten,” said the Earl without enthusiasm. He had met the clergyman a year ago at the Alston lead mines over a matter of arranging burial service for one of the Earl’s Protestant miners, and he had then thought Patten both greedy and servile.

Yet King James had directed that they enlist as many Protestants as possible. And a cleric might be useful as spy or messenger.

“Now ‘tis time we march to Coquetdale,” said Tom wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. “Oxburgh says there’s a moor near Rothbury’s to be our next rally ground.”

Coquetdale! Charles thought. So he was to go back to that wild Border where lived Meg -- and Jenny.

“I suggest,” James said, “that we march by way of Beaufront, where Tom Errington awaits us with whatever men he’s been able to muster.”

“And I quite agree, sir,” said Oxburgh to Forster, who was frowning while he mulled over this new idea. In a moment, having nothing better to suggest, Tom nodded graciously. “So be it. We’ll march through Corbridge wi’ drawn swords, show ‘em our mettle, eh? Now we’re fifty strong.”

“And maybe have a skirmish!” cried Charles, delighted. “Some action at last after all this while of skulking about!”

“I doubt ye’re so pleased wi’ action when ye get it, m’lad,” said Tom repressively. “And don’t ye start anything, young buck, d’ye hear!”

“Yes, sir,” said Charles, trying to sound properly submissive to a general who had somehow been metamorphosed from Tom Forster, the fat, pompous, turnip-headed country squire.

They certainly saw no action that day, nor for many weeks thereafter. Wherever they marched the people ran from their houses, stared at the Jacobite standard, then drew back murmuring, watchful. But nobody challenged them. Occasionally a cheer was raised for King James -- usually in a female voice. Twice they picked up a recruit, but Forster refused several who were not already furnished with arms or horses. “Ye can come out later,” he said to these volunteers, “when we’ve taken Newcastle. Then we’ll have gear for foot-soldiers.”

At dusk they reached the Coquet River, crossed it at Hepple, and went to Plainfield moor, a lonely heath some miles west of Rothbury. Here there was already a campfire burning and a party of horsemen were waiting as Forster’s troops rode up.

Charles listened rather absently to the greetings and information from the Coquetdale contingent, none of whom he knew, with the exception of young George Collingwood of Eslington. Some stonemason called Robson seemed to be spokesman, and assured Forster that the little town of Rothbury was chiefly Jacobite and therefore quite safe to use as headquarters. That enough lodging for all had been commandeered, and it was thus not necessary to camp on this comfortless moor.

While the parley was in progress, Charles kept gazing across the Coquet to the jagged black outline of the Simonside Hills. The highest peak was Tosson. And beneath it--not three miles from here -- the Snowdon peel huddled in its narrow glen. I have a wife and child there, Charles thought. An incongruity which moved him to painful amusement. And he stared again across the river.

“Come along, Charlie,” said James in surprise, seeing by the firelight an odd expression on his brother’s face. “We’re off to Rothbury for the night. What ails you, are you weary?”

Charles started to explain, then thought better of it. James had quite enough to worry him without reminder of his brother’s predicament. Besides, Charles had just made a decision, and did not wish to provoke a restraining command.

The whole company rode along the Coquet into Rothbury, where the men of rank were quartered at the Three Half Moons next the church. Others went to the Black Bull, and the rest were bedded down in various lodgings.

The Earl had a room to himself up under the inn’s thatching, and Charles was relieved when James, after eating and drinking moderately, said that he would retire. “You’ve a bed with the Swinburne lads, haven’t you? Mind you don’t get drunk, Charles. We’ve a hard march to Warkworth tomorrow. And leave the town lasses be!”

“Aye, my lord,” said Charles grinning. He glanced into the crowded taproom, where Forster was waving a tankard and singing “Though Geordie Reigns in Jamie’s Stead,” and “The Wee Wee German Lairdie” at the top of his lungs. Then Charles slipped around to the inn kitchen and asked for Alec Armstrong, his valet.

Alec, with his mouth full of oatcake, ran to his master. “Are ye ready for bed, sir?”

“No. Saddle a horse and fetch me a lantern.”

“Shall I come?” asked Alec eagerly, and when Charles shook his head, he added, “Ye’ll be prudent, sir? Might be dangerous to ride out.”

“Bosh,” said Charles. “This junket’s like no war I ever heard of. Tame as milk. Don’t wait up for me.”

Charles rode unnoticed out of Rothbury, where the two inns and many houses were crammed with noisy celebrating Jacobites. He crossed the bridge and turned west for Tosson. The road was good so far, he had fitful moonlight and the lantern to guide him, also his excellent memory of the silent ride along this road with John Snowdon on the way back to Dilston. When he came to a farmhouse at Ryehill, the farmer’s wife, though obviously startled, acceded to his courteous insistence and gave him further directions.

In a while he turned south up a cart track and followed a burn until it reached the moors, and he saw ahead the dark boxy shape of the Snowdon peel. Intermingled with the gurgle of a little cascade he heard the droning of the small-pipes and the sound of a boyish voice singing. As Charles’s horse clopped up, a big shock-haired lad ran out from the cow-byre in the peel, crying, “Wot the de’il do ye want here, stranger?”

Charles raised his lantern and with some surprise recognized Rob Wilson, but before he could speak, the door above the stone steps opened and Meg called down sharply, “What i’st, Rob? Who’s belaw?”

“It’s Charles Radcliffe, Meg,” said Charles guiding his horse to the foot of the steps. “I’ve come to see you and the child.”

He saw her stiffen, and put her hand to the doorpost. She flung a quick look over her shoulder into the room behind. Then she shut the door behind her and came down the steps. Charles dismounted and waited for her. She seemed much older, almost gaunt. Her brown hair hung in wisps on her shoulders. Her feet were bare, and filthy.

“Gan awa’,” she said in a tense breathless voice. “Ye mustna come here. Ye’re one o’ the Jack rebels, one o’ the foul traitors who’re o’errunning Coquetdale.”

Charles controlled a spurt of anger. “And if I
am
one of those who ride for King James, yet I have a right to see my wife and my child.”

She shook her head and interlaced her fingers tight in the way he remembered. “Faither’d kill ye gin he found ye here! He’d kill ye. M’brothers would too. Kill any rebel like a dog.”

“Where
are
your menfolk?” asked Charles dryly.

“Up i’ the hills bringing down the sheep. Oh gan awa’ -- and leave us be. We’ve all forgot ye lang syne.”

“I’ll leave when I’ve seen Jenny,” said Charles. “Meg, I used to think you gentle and just. You have altered indeed. You’ve grown harsh like your father.”

“That’s naught to you.” She lifted her chin, and her face was somber in the flickering light.

“Let him see his bairn, Meg,” said Rob Wilson suddenly, from the shadows by the byre. “I’ll keep watch belaw here, an’ warn ye gin I hear the men.”

Meg turned on Rob furiously. “Oh, ye’re besotted over the bairn! Ye think our life here’s not good enow fur her! Na doubt ye’d like Jenny to mince around in silks an’ satins!”

Charles was startled and glanced at the boy, but this was no time for wonderings. And he spoke in cold determination. “I insist upon my right to see my daughter, and will do so, Meg -- whether you wish it or no.” He started to push her aside and mount the stairs, but she made a rough sound in her throat, let her hands fall open and led the way silently. They entered the square dark room, which smelled stronger than ever of peat smoke and dung and mutton fat. A tallow dip flickered on the clumsy table. In the corner cubicle boarded off from the room, the five-year-old child slept on a straw-stuffed pallet. Charles held his lantern high and walked into the tiny room. Meg made a quick restraining gesture, then checked it.

Charles knelt down on the stone floor by his child. He saw the fair curly hair clinging in tendrils around a rosy face which was squared at the jaws, a little like Meg’s. Nothing else resembled Meg. The dimple in the baby chin would someday be a cleft like his own. And the outspread fingers as they lay on the ragged quilt were long, delicately modeled. Charles gazed at her, feeling all the instinctive poignancy, the yearning love he had felt on the morning of her birth. Jenny stirred and, opening her dark gray eyes, looked up, and smiled. “Gentle-man,” she announced contentedly in a clear little voice. “Bonny gentle-man.”

“I’m your father, Jenny,” said Charles, his voice quivering.

The child smiled again, misted with sleep, then the round eyes grew puzzled. “Faither?” she said tentatively. “I ha’ no faither. Less ye mean gran’faither?”

“ ‘Tis what he means,” said Meg sharply. “Shut your een, bairnie, an’ back to sleep wi’ ye! Ye’re dreaming! For God’s love,” added Meg in a whisper to Charles, “come awa’ now, she mustna tell she saw ye here, or I darena think -- ”

The child shut her eyes obediently. Charles leaned over and gave her a kiss on the forehead. Then he got up. “Meg, I’ve got to talk with you.” They walked to the fire in the big room.

“What about?” snapped Meg, her face hardening. “We’ve naught to say to each other. Ye’ve seen the bairn. Gan back to your ranting Papist rebels!”

“Damn it, Meg!” cried Charles furiously. He paused to master himself, and marshal his arguments. “Listen,” he said on a softer tone. “You love the child, I know that. Will you not believe I love her too?”

“I see no reason fur it.” The brown eyes stared at him like a wary animal’s, watchful, uncertain.

“Do you think it right to keep her here far ever, buried like -- like
a
pearl in a raven’s nest! Do you think it right for a Radcliffe to go barefoot, sleep on straw, and be reared with rough men who think of nothing but their cattle and sheep and their fanatical creed?”

Meg stared at him, her lips grew thin. “Jenny’s a Snawdon. She’s mine. Ye’ll niver-r get her awa’ fra me!”

“Not now,” said Charles. “I can’t do anything for her, right now, and she’s over young. But when King James is on the throne, and the country’s settled down, then, Meg, don’t you see what I can do for Jenny? She must go to London, be educated, learn her true place as a gentlewoman and a Radcliffe. You
couldn’t
be so selfish as to keep her mewed up forever in this crumbling hovel in the wilderness!”

“Ha!” cried Meg. “So ye’d turn her into a Papist, as Faither iver said!”

“No,” said Charles, after a moment. “I’d not force her. When she is grown she may decide these matters for herself. I’d place her in a Protestant home, if you like. There are many ladies who’d take her, and rear her gently.” Betty, he thought to his own amazement. Would Betty Lee take her?

“Aye,” Meg said with a harsh laugh, watching him. “For love o’ you, na doubt, many ladies might do much.” Charles stared at her. He had by now had many experiences with jealous women, but so different was Meg from any of them, and so long ago were both his brief infatuation for her and then his pity on the night of their marriage that he could not think of her in this light.

“Is it that you might want to go with Jenny to London?” he said slowly, thinking of all the complications and embarrassments this could mean.

“Nay,” she cried. “Ye’ll niver make a lady o’ me. I tould ye that afore. And the Faws said -- that night at Newcastle--” For the first time she faltered. The hard look left her eyes and she turned away. She had been about to throw in his face what the Faw woman had said to him. “The royal blood in thy veins is accursed, true love can not flow in it, no sweetheart need hope for true love from thee.” But now came memory of the other things the Faw woman had said. That the white rose would wither and turn black, that there was a bloody axe in Charles’s fate. She had forgotten this part during the long years of willful bitterness. Was it possible that those dire words could still move her heart to fear for him whose handsome face was turned towards her with coldness and yet a pleading which had nothing to do with her -- only with Jenny?