The Enchantress (Book 1 of The Enchantress Saga) (49 page)

‘’Tis nobly spoke,’ Lord Falconer said. ‘Now to the details of the plan. For if you are to be in time you cannot delay a moment. They are despatching the criminals like hens in a farmyard I hear.’

21

The governor of Edinburgh Castle, Colonel Guest, was a stern man. He ruled his castle and its garrison with a fist of iron and gave little quarter. He shared with the Tolbooth and Canongate prisons responsibility for the large number of captured Jacobites who had supported the Prince, in battle or otherwise. He had many noblewomen in his castle, too, who had rallied to the Prince, either by raising bodies of fighting men themselves or by selling their jewels or by defying reluctant husbands.

Most of his prisoners were of the rank and file and in batches they left the castle to be taken for trial at Carlisle, Chester, York or Lancaster. Once in England lots were cast among the men for those who were to be tried, one in twenty. The rest were deported or, ultimately, pardoned and freed according to the degree of guilt. Colonel Guest cared little as to what happened to any of them.

He had one or two special prisoners, like Murray of Broughton and Brent Delamain, whose offences were deemed enough to hang them. These were kept apart from the rest while a strong escort was awaited to take them to London.

An orderly stood at the door and the Governor, who had been studying papers, looked up.

‘A Mrs Delamain to see her husband, sir. She has come from Keswick and knows he is soon to be taken to England.’

‘Is there permission?’

‘From General Hawley himself, sir,’ the orderly handed the governor a note which he barely glanced at. He had no time for these sentimental gestures on the part of the authorities. In his opinion rogues like Delamain should be denied all privileges.

‘It may be the last time she sees him, sir. She is said to be unwell and her brother has accompanied her.’

‘
Is
he
to be admitted, too?’

‘’Tis on the order, sir.’

‘Oh get it over. See ‘tis kept short. Traitors have no rights in my opinion; they all deserve the gallows.  Have the prisoner Delamain brought up.’

Mary stood trembling in the small room near the entrance to the prison. Even though John was with her she was terrified. Lord Falconer’s plan had seemed so simple in the shelter of Falcon’s Keep, but here it seemed impossible. As they waited John tightly held her hand and she pressed it, unable to speak.

She hardly recognized her husband when he was brought in. He was so thin and gaunt and he dragged his leg with pain. He blinked his eyes against the light and scarcely seemed able to recognize her.

‘Brent, it is Mary.’

‘Aye, so I heard. Why did you come, Mary, to distress yourself thus? I have not been a good husband to you. Start life again ...’ John moved quickly over to Brent and seized his arm.

‘Do not waste time talking. Remove your clothes.’  Brent stared at him and held up his arms.

‘How can I remove my clothes in chains?’

Curse, they had forgotten that!

‘Then your breeches merely. My jacket will conceal the chains.’

‘You are ...’ Brent gazed at him in amazement.

‘Rescuing you. I am taking your place. We are the same colour, the same build ...’

John had not reckoned with Brent’s emaciated appearance, but it was too late now. The best laid plans always misfired so he had heard. He was prepared to brazen it out now, whatever happened.

‘Haste man. We have no time to tarry.’

‘But they will try you in my place.’

‘We think not; but it is a chance I must take.’

John had removed most of his clothes and kept glancing anxiously at the door. As if accepting the inevitability of what was happening, Brent stumped out of his breeches with Mary’s help and donned John’s clothes.

‘We will never get away with it.’

‘We might. ‘Tis dark in here. Here now, my hat, pull it well over your face which has a ghastly prison pallor. There. Good-bye sweet sister.  Brent come!’

‘John I cannot ...’

John gazed at his cousin, at his sister.

‘It is all I have done for the Cause, Brent. Is it too much to ask I be allowed my contribution? Even if I die I die happy; but I think I will not. Even the Hanoverians do not kill innocent men ... at least officially. Now call the guard. It is important he does not come in first. Say Mary is too upset and I will tarry here until they come for me. Mary must create a commotion with her weeping. ‘Tis part of the plan. Quick.’

Mary began to wail loudly and Brent limped over to the door. John observed the limp and bit his lip. How they had ever hoped to get away with this ...

The door opened and the guard peered into the gloom. ‘What is it?’

‘My sister is greatly distressed and her husband would have us go.’

‘Ah ...’ the guard shrugged and opened wide the door, glancing at the prisoner slumped dejectedly by the window. He had seen it happen so often lately as all the men were being sent to England; it was a sorry business. He locked the door and shepherded the weeping woman to the gate having little regard for the man who walked slowly behind her. He knew only one woman had come in and only one woman had gone out. No one had warned them to take much notice of the men. He saw the weeping woman through the gate and returned to the darkness of the prison. He would just finish his game of dice before taking the prisoner back to the dungeons. There was no hurry.

***

Analee sat in the carriage holding tightly to Nelly’s hand. She stared anxiously at the castle gate and shared with those inside it the strong conviction that the plan would not succeed. Now that it had happened it seemed idiotic to suspect it would. Forging General Hawley’s signature had been foolhardy, though Angus had a letter from him and they tried to copy his hand. They were being a long time and she stared anxiously at Nelly.

‘It has gone wrong!’

‘Hush,’ Nelly comforted, ‘you are too impatient. They have only been gone for a few moments. There is the governor to see and all sorts of things.’

Lord Falconer had not wished his wife to accompany Mary and John; after all, what had she to do with it? And if she was discovered?  He had been foolish enough as it was. But the Falcon, if he did not know it before, was becoming aware of the stubbornness of the woman he had married. She would not take ‘no’ for an answer. If she wanted a thing she would get it. The only place he found her at all submissive was in bed, and even there she also seemed subtly to exercise her own particular kind of dominance. She was remarkable. He had let her go after warning her not to expect a visit from him when she was lodged in the castle as a prisoner of His Majesty along with Lady Strathallan and Lady Ogilvy.

But Analee had felt she owed it to Mary to see that she got Brent back; and, besides, she wanted to talk to Brent. They had stayed the night on the way with Jacobite friends of the Allonbys who had so far been spared persecution by the government, and they would stop there on the way back. After that Analee would return to her husband and see Brent no more.

The gate of the castle swung back and she clasped Nelly’s hand and closed her eyes.

‘Oh, Nelly ...’

‘Aye ‘tis them. ‘Tis Mary and ... why, Analee, it is Brent. There is no doubt for he drags a leg and Mr John walked in quite firm and straight.’

Nelly tumbled out of the carriage at the same time as McNeath jumped from the box. They had thought to effect the escape in a light coach driven by McNeath so as to involve no further members of the household. Nelly ran up to Mary and put her arm about her, but, as planned, McNeath stayed by the coach. To anyone looking on, any guard or soldier, they must appear to be merely a sorrowing family, not the escort for the escape of an important Jacobite passenger.

Yes it was Brent, but how changed. So changed, so unlike John except in height that Analee wondered how they had achieved it. She leaned forward and held the door open, clasping Mary as she stumbled in. Then Brent followed and almost before they had sat down and closed the door McNeath had whipped his horses into a fast trot down the hill from Edinburgh Castle into the teeming streets of the town clustered in its shadow.

Everyone was breathing hard and now Nelly was also crying. Analee had tears in her eyes as she looked at the face of the exhausted man; his head back on his seat, his eyes closed. Analee studied his face to see whether she felt any emotion ... tired or starved or ill or whatever, he was still Brent, her one time lover, Morella’s father. Yes, there were traces of the handsome man he had been, eyes made even finer now by suffering, the curve of the mouth, the fine arch of the brow ...

Brent opened his eyes and looked straight into those of Analee. Then he quickly shut them again. He reopened them cautiously as one does when expecting a shock. She smiled at him reassuringly.

‘Yes, Brent.  It is I, Analee.  I have contrived to help your escape.’

‘Analee ...’  Brent leaned his head back and closed his eyes again. Analee. Was it possible? But she did not look like Analee in those fine clothes, that gorgeous cloak, the elegant hat with a plume.

Analee with a
hat
?
Brent opened his eyes and looked again. It was not Analee, could not be. Why this person undoubtedly had her eyes and resembled Analee; but ... she wore shoes, and carried a bag and her hands were gloved. No it could not be Analee, the wild gypsy he had loved.

‘It is I, Brent,’ Analee said gently knowing full well what was going on in his mind, ‘but I am married now to a man of substance, a lord ...’

‘The Marquess of Falconer,’ Nelly said firmly,
‘General
The Marquess of Falconer.’

Brent opened his eyes and his lips trembled in a faint laugh.

‘The Falcon? This is a joke someone is playing on me. He is a Hanoverian soldier, a man known for his mercilessness in battle. I thought he was killed at Falkirk and we all said “good riddance”. Why should he be married to Analee? No I am dead and this is a dream.’

‘It is no dream, Brent, and we shall explain all by and by.  For the moment rest and be thankful that you are alive.’

Rory Macintoch had fought with Brent in all the Scottish battles. He had escaped from Culloden and was overjoyed to see him again. They were to spend the night together in the priest’s hole in the house because they were loyal Catholics as well as Jacobites. Servants kept a twenty-four hour guard in the grounds of the house; but even during the day Rory kept out of sight.

Luckily in this remote part of Scotland few people outside the house would even be aware of the visit of Mrs Delamain and her brother, nor would it be noted as exceptional. Fiona Macintoch and Mary Allonby were old friends.

Fiona was a girl very like Mary in upbringing. She had known deprivation all her life, though it was especially bad for her family since the Act of Union. Up to that time Scotland had had its own Parliament; after that the country was ruled from London. At least Queen Anne, in whose reign the union took place, had been a Stuart; but after her death and the German Elector of Hanover usurped the English throne – according to her family’s view of things – there was no going back. The English were hated and opposed at every turn. If the Allonbys thought they had martyrs to the Cause the Macintochs had more. In the present rising alone Fiona had lost another brother, killed, and a father who was in hiding with Cluny Macpherson in his cave in the highlands.

But to see Brent alive, even if he looked far from well ... And to hear the part played by Lady Falconer, of all people. But Fiona was sworn to secrecy, that was a trust she would never betray. Like many Scots people near the border she had heard of Lord Falconer’s sudden marriage to a fascinating gypsy – the Falcon was a law to himself, so everyone expected him to do something different. But a gypsy! How would
she
be received at the court of George II?

Fiona had taken to the new bride immediately, sensing her warmth and concern for the Allonby family. She had also trusted her. There was a strength about Analee that had convinced Fiona that if anyone could pull off the audacious coup she could. Mary jokingly said she was a witch but would not admit it.

Seeing Brent now among them and hearing how it was carried out, of the forged letter and the risky plan that had succeeded, Fiona was convinced Analee
was
a witch. How otherwise could she possibly have succeeded?

What was more the Marchioness, despite her beautiful clothes, was not the one to stand on ceremony. She knew that the Macintochs were poor and what servants there were patrolled the grounds of the house. Her ladyship set to in the kitchen and insisted on helping Fiona prepare the dinner while Mary, still shocked, rested in her room and Brent was put to sleep in the priest’s hole after his sore leg had been bathed and his chains cut off, with some difficulty, by McNeath.

‘My lady, I insist you should not come into the kitchen.’

‘Nonsense,’ Analee said. ‘You know I am a simple gypsy woman?’

Fiona, a bonny girl of nineteen with auburn hair smiled.

‘I have
heard
it said, your ladyship. I do not know I believe it.’

‘’Tis true,’ said Analee, ‘now tell me what I have to do and I will do it.  Do you have meat to carve?  Bread to cut?’ She stared at Fiona noting her amazed expression.

‘I see you do not think I am a gypsy. Is not my face dark and my eyes black?  If I could show you my feet through these fine stockings you would see that I spent most of my life barefoot. It is the one thing my lord complains of, the scratch of my feet in bed. He says it is as though I wore boots!’

Fiona threw up her hands and laughed.

‘Oh, Lady Falconer ...
you
are very droll. Still Mary did say that you were a gypsy; she saw you as one. She says you have magical powers.’

‘I have not; but we gypsies have a certain ... way with us, you know. Maybe it is that. Now let us eat, girl, for I must be away at first light to my husband. You will see that Brent and Mary go on from here?’

‘That is the plan. They will travel on horseback to Cockermouth where Mr Rigg has agreed to give Brent shelter until a boat may be found to take him to Ireland. Mary will stay for a while with Mr Rigg and her sister ...’