Doctor Who: The Highlanders (3 page)

3

Algernon Ffinch was the very picture of a British officer from the mid 18th century. Elegantly turned out from his tricorn hat to his white stockings and buckled shoes, Algernon was handsome and had that ramrod stiffness in his spine that British officers throughout the centuries have always favoured.

He was standing on top of a small hill, gazing down the glen towards the cottage in which the Doctor and the Highland refugees were taking cover. Beside him there was a sergeant who presented a total contrast to the elegant, foppish Algernon. Sergeant Klegg was short, very broadly built, and after twenty years in the British army had seen every sort of action and felt himself a match for any situation. The Sergeant saluted and pointed down towards the cottage.

‘We’ve sighted some rebels, sir. There was a shot, seemed to come from that cottage.’

‘Rebels? Well, it’s about time. They all seem to have melted into the heather.’

‘Them cavalry blokes, the dragoons, were ahead of us.’

‘Well,’ Algernon shrugged his shoulders, ‘I suppose they’ve driven them all the way to Glasgow by now. I wish they’d left us some pickings, though.’

‘Those wot got away took their possessions with them, sir.’

Algernon nodded wearily. ‘Let’s hope so. Take two men round to the rear of the cottage, Sergeant, we’ll outflank them.’

‘Yes sir.’ The Sergeant turned and signalled to two of his men. ‘Hey, you two! Cut down there quick. And don’t make too much noise about it!’

Algernon turned. ‘Tell them to shoot first, and take no risks. Remember, these rebels will be desperate men by now. Savages, the lot of them.’

‘Sir.’ The Sergeant saluted and followed in the path of the two men.

Algernon turned to the remainder of his platoon, some fourteen soldiers. ‘Right, men,’ he called. ‘Fix bayonets and advance in battle order.’

The soldiers with their red coats crossed with pipeclayed bandoliers, drew their bayonets out of their scabbards and fixed them to the ends of their long muskets. They spread out and started moving down the side of the glen through the thick heather towards the cottage.

Inside the cottage, the atmosphere was tense. Alexander, disregarding the Doctor and Ben’s pistol, reached for his sword and went to the door. Jamie turned and ran after him.

‘Must we be caught here like rats in a trap? We must run for it, mon.’

Alexander spoke through clenched teeth. ‘And leave the Laird to their mercy? There is one chance and it’s aye a slender one. I will try and draw them away from this cottage.’

The Doctor looked up from the Laird; he had finished bandaging the man’s wound. ‘Wait a minute...’

But Alexander was already out of the cottage and running out to face the oncoming English troops. He raised his claymore sword high above his head and called the bloodcurdling shrill rallying cry of Clan McLaren.

‘
Creag an tuire.
’

There was a ragged chorus of musketry as the soldiers fell on one knee, raised their muskets, and fired at the Highlander. One of the musket-balls hit Alexander in the shoulder, and he staggered but continued his advance up towards the oncoming English troopers. The second rank of the English Redcoats fired. Alexander jerked convulsively as the balls hit him and slowly crumpled forward. He raised his claymore for one last act of defiance, but the sword dropped from his hand and he fell over face downward in the heather.

Jamie, standing by the door of the cottage, had witnessed it all and, upset, shrank back covering his eyes with his hand, unable to stand the sight of his friend’s gallant but futile death. Behind him, Ben and the Doctor watched transfixed, as the Sergeant and the two troopers took up positions behind them with levelled bayonets.

‘Surrender in the King’s name!’ The Sergeant’s rough voice startled the three. Jamie looked wildly around for escape but, caught between the two troopers and the advancing circle of Redcoats, realised that escape was out of the question. Ben looked curiously at the Sergeant’s red uniform and the tall hat.

‘Blimey,’ he said, ‘it’s nice to hear a London voice again.’

The Sergeant stepped forward fearfully. ‘Silence you rebel dog.’

Ben started back. ‘Rebel, what you talking about? I’m no rebel. Me and the Doctor here, we just arrived.’

The Sergeant shrugged his shoulders. ‘Deserter, then.

You’ll hang just the same.’

‘Hang!’ said Ben, astonished. ‘Me? I’m on your side, you can’t –’ But the Doctor put his hand on Ben’s shoulder and stepped forward.

To Ben’s astonishment, the Doctor spoke in a heavy German accent. ‘I am glad you hav come, Sergeant,’ he said. ‘I hav been vaiting for an escort.’ The Sergeant was astonished at the Doctor’s easy authority and his strange clothes.

‘Who do you think you are then?’ he said.

‘Ven you find out,’ said the Doctor, ‘you vill perhaps learn to keep a civil tongue in your head, nein? Are you in charge here?’

While the Sergeant stared at him, speechless at being spoken to in this way by a man he considered one of the rebels, Algernon Ffinch came up to them having overheard the Doctor’s words. ‘No,’ he said, ‘I’m the officer here.’

The Doctor turned to him and bowed. ‘Ah, a gentleman at last. Doctor von Verner at your service.’ He clicked his heels and bowed again.

‘Oh,’ said Algernon. ‘One of those demned froggies that came over with the Pretender, eh?’

That was too much for Ben. ‘Froggies!’ he said. ‘Do we look like froggies?’ He turned to the Doctor. ‘He thinks we’re French.’

The Doctor shook his head. ‘Ach, no. I am German, from Hanover where your King George comes from. And I speak English much better than he does.’

The Sergeant who had been keeping his temper with some difficulty now burst out. ‘’Ear that, sir? Treason it is!

Shall I hang them now?’

Algernon shook his head. ‘No,’ he said. ‘W – wait a moment.’ He stumbled slightly over his consonants in a way approved by the London dandies of the time. He stepped into the cottage and looked around. ‘Let’s see who else we have here.’

Jamie tried to get between the officer and the bedroom where the Laird was resting, but the troopers seized hold of him and pulled him out of the way. Algernon walked through, followed by Ben, the Doctor, and the Sergeant, and looked over at the now unconscious Colin lying on the bracken bed.

‘Who is that man?’ he said. He turned to Jamie.

‘Colin McLaren, the Laird,’ said Jamie. ‘And I’m his piper, Jamie McCrimmon, ye ken.’

The Sergeant turned and spat on the floor. ‘A poor lot, sir,’ he said. ‘We’ll get no decent pickings here. Let’s hang them and have done.’

Ben turned on him. ‘You’re a right shower, you are.

What have we done? –Nothing. And what have you got against them two? They lost a battle, right? Doesn’t that make them prisoners of war?’

Algernon turned slightly towards Ben and spoke over his shoulder coldly. ‘Rebels are not treated as p-p-p-prisoners of war,’ he said. He turned to the Sergeant as he drew out a lace handkerchief from his sleeve, holding it to his nose against the close smell of the cottage. ‘Right, Sergeant, you may prepare to hang them.’

The Sergeant saluted. ‘Sir.’ He turned to the men. ‘You, you, take ’em through there and hang them.’

Ben could hardly speak, he was so astonished. The Doctor stood back, considering, as two of the troopers pulled Colin to his feet, still half conscious, and dragged him out of the door. Jamie tried to run up to them but the other two men held him fast.

‘Ya canna do that,’ he said. ‘He’s...’

‘And take him too,’ said the Sergeant. ‘He’s next.’

The Doctor stepped forward. ‘I vould advise you not to do this,’ he said. He turned. ‘Ben here and myself, ve are witnesses, no?’

Algernon turned to consider him for a moment. ‘Yes,’

he said, ‘that’s right,’ He called after the Sergeant. ‘And when you’re done with those two, you can hang these riffraff.’ He turned and walked out of the room.

Solicitor Grey was sitting on the high seat of a supply wagon for the Duke of Cumberland’s British Army. He had been watching the battle through a telescope, which he now shut up and placed back in a leather case beside him on the seat. He was a tall, thin man with a face the colour of his name. In fact, everything about the solicitor was grey, from his mud-spattered coat to his long, lank grey hair carefully held back in a bow in the manner of the period, and his long grey riding boots. His voice had the dusty echo of the law chambers and the penetrating edge acquired from years of pleading cases in court. There was a dangerous stillness about the man. He never allowed his feelings to get in the way of his business, and everything was considered in a purely logical light without the softening shadow of ordinary humanity or human feelings.

He turned to look down at his clerk, Perkins, who was standing by an upturned barrel on which he was spreading out a cold lunch for his master. Perkins was a complete contrast to his master. His clothes were mussed up and untidy compared with the solicitor’s neatly tied cravat and well-buttoned waistcoat. Perkins, a short, slightly fat man, looked as though his buttons were in the wrong holes. His pockets bulged, his sleeves were ragged at the ends, and his hands were covered with inkstains because Perkins was a solicitor’s clerk, and his main duties were the endless copying and drafting of legal documents.

Grey started clambering down from the wagon. ‘Not a very inspiring battle, wouldn’t you say, Perkins?’

Perkins looked up. ‘Don’t really know, sir. I’ve never seen a battle before.’ He spoke with a slight Cockney accent, in contrast to Grey’s neutral, even tones.

Grey shrugged his shoulders. ‘This one was over in but a brief hour. I have never seen brave fellows so poorly led.’

He brought out a handkerchief and wiped dust from the wagon off his hands. ‘Now,’ he continued, ‘our brave Duke’s troops are busy bayoneting the wounded. Such a waste of manpower.’ He shook his head in disgust and handed the telescope to Perkins, who carefully put it away in the large food hamper beside the barrel. ‘Well,’ said Grey, yawning and stretching, ‘at least it’s given me an appetite. I think I’ll have a little wine.’

Perkins rubbed his hands enthusiastically, his eyes lighting up at the mention of food. ‘Oh, yes sir, yes sir.’ He indicated the barrel top on which he had laid out cold chicken, ham, bread, and a bottle of red wine. He started to pour a glass of wine for his master. ‘I’m quite ready for it, sir,’ he said. ‘It must be this sharp northern air, sir. Gives one quite an appetite, doesn’t it?’

As he talked, two soldiers came along, half dragging the wounded Highlander and urging him on with kicks and blows. As he passed, the Scot turned and looked longingly at the food.

‘You’ll get plenty to eat where you’re going, old mate, never fear,’ said one of the soldiers, laughing at the man.

‘Yeah,’ said the other soldier, ‘worms, most like. Get on with you.’ And he kicked the Highlander again as they walked away up the path.

Grey sat down on an upturned crate set beside the barrel and held the wine up to examine it for pieces of floating cork. ‘All these fine fellows,’ he said, ‘sturdy, used to hard work and little food. Think what a price such men would fetch in Barbados, or Jamaica, Perkins.’

Perkins, who had been trying to stuff a piece of chicken in his mouth while his master was distracted looking at the wounded Highlander, swallowed it hastily. ‘A pretty penny, no doubt sir. No doubt at all.’

‘Indeed,’ continued Grey. ‘And I’ll have them, Perkins.

I did not leave a thriving legal practice at Lincoln’s Inn just for the honour of serving King George as his Commissioner of Prisons.’ He picked up a napkin Perkins had neatly folded and placed on the barrel, and fastidiously tied it around his neck. Perkins had filled a plate for his master with meat, cheese, onions and bread, and handed it to Grey.

‘I thought there was more behind it, sir.’

‘With Mr Trask and his ship at our service, we may expect to clear some measure of profit from this rebellion, eh Mr Perkins?’

‘Oh yes, sir.’

‘Depending, of course, on how many of these wretched rebels we can deliver from His Majesty’s over-zealous soldiers.’ Grey took a mouthful of the red wine and then, suddenly rising as he tasted it, spat it into Perkins’ face.

Perkins started back in surprise, gaping at his master as he brought out a handkerchief and started wiping his face.

Grey dabbed at his mouth with a fine lace handkerchief he carried in his top pocket and as though nothing untoward had occurred, said, ‘I thought so, Perkins. The wine was corked. If you wish to continue in my service you’ll have to be more careful, won’t you, Perkins?’ He turned and glanced at the frightened little man beside him, and for a moment the sinister force of the lawyer became apparent as Perkins shrank back. ‘You’ll have to be
much
more careful, won’t you, Perkins?’ Grey repeated.

Perkins nodded apologetically, stumbling over his words. ‘I’m very sorry, sir. My apologies. It really won’t happen again, I promise you, sir.’ As he spoke there was a ragged burst of musketry. Grey mounted the step of the wagon and looked over in the distance.

The mist was beginning to clear and around them they could now make out the dimensions of the battlefield of Culloden Moor, with small groups of Redcoats scouring the brakes and pitches for the few knots of Highlanders still left.

Grey frowned. ‘We must be about our duties, although we’ve nothing but corpses left on the battlefield.’ He looked down at Perkins and smiled a cold smile. ‘And corpses are little use to us, eh Perkins? Come,’ he said,

‘let’s go.’ Without more ado, Grey jumped from the wagon and strode off, leaving the small, fat clerk hastily shoving the food back into the hamper.

Perkins picked up the wine and held it up to the light, but couldn’t see what his master was annoyed about. He shrugged and, raising the bottle to his mouth, took a deep swig.

‘Perkins!’ Grey’s urgent tone came back to him. The solicitor was striding away across the moor. Perkins, almost choking, flung the bottle away in the heather then, grabbing the hamper, scrambled after his master.