The Rebel’s Daughter (14 page)

Helena gasped
as together, they tumbled onto the road, with Bayle’s full weight
on top of the soldier, who had no chance to cry out.

In the instant
it took for his companion to register what was happening, without
thinking, Helena leapt down from the cart and swept the second
musket from the ground.

The soldier
froze, both hands held up in surrender, his eyes going from her
face to the gun and back again.

Aware she could
never work out how to fire the weapon in time, even if it was
loaded, anger and desperation gave her strength as she swung it in
a wide arc, catching the butt on the side of his head.

The soldier hit
the ground with a dull thump, and stayed there.

With no hand on
the rein, the startled horses crabbed sideways, the rear wheels
threatening to crush Bayle and the soldier beneath him.

Dropping the
musket, Helena ran to the front of the cart and grabbed the reins,
stilling the horses.

Bayle’s
superior weight pinned the officer to the road, though he flailed
uselessly with both arms. Bayle scrambled to his knees, pulled his
arm back and punched the man squarely in the face. The flailing
stopped as the man lost consciousness.

Torn between
trying to help and keeping the cart still, Helena could only watch
with growing horror as the soldier she had hit stumbled to his feet
and pulled a knife from his belt. He must have still been stunned
as he swayed, and staggered towards Helena.

She opened her
mouth to shout, but just then Bayle yelled, “Helena, Move!”

Instinctively,
she threw herself sideways away from the cart, hit the ground and
lay still just as a shot echoed across the fields, sending up a
flock of crows in a nearby tree, dying away quickly into the
afternoon quiet.

She rolled
over, in time to see the soldier’s eyes widen in shock. He crumpled
to his knees as a crimson bloom spread over the front of his shirt.
The knife fell from his hand and with a final grunt, he fell
forwards onto the road.

Shaking, Helena
scrambled to her feet and staggered toward the cart, grabbing at
the reins just as the wheels began to turn again. A groan came from
the man on the ground behind them. Helena was about to call out in
warning, but in two strides, Bayle raised the musket he had just
fired and brought the wooden butt down on the man’s temple with a
sickening crack.

Helena thrust
her fist into her mouth to muffle a scream, transfixed by the
unnatural dent in the man’s skull. She looked down at her skirt,
where spots of blood soaked into the fabric.

The metallic
tang of blood filled the air. The horses snorted in panic and
strained against the reins, taking all Helena’s strength to keep
them from bolting. When she could bring herself to look, Bayle was
dragging the shot soldier toward a deep ditch at the side of the
road.

“There should
have been six of them,” Bayle grunted as with a final heave, the
body rolled into the ditch, flattening the long grass on the
incline.

“Help me,”
Bayle instructed, indicating the second man.

Her chest
heaved and she widened her eyes in shock, but bracing herself, she
gripped the end of the soldier’s long buff coat and with Bayle
bearing most of the weight, they inched toward the ditch.

Helena closed
her eyes as the body disappeared over the side, though it made no
sound.

“They are
visible if one stands here,” Bayle said, “Though I doubt they can
be spotted by a casual observer from the road.

“How long
before they find them, do you think?” Helena asked.

“The others, if
there are any, could be back at any time.” Bayle jerked his head
toward the road ahead. “They are always in packs, like dogs.” He
collected the other musket and threw both guns in after them.

“What about
their horses?” Helena nodded toward the docile animals grazing a
few feet away.

“We’ll get rid
of anything which marks them out as soldiers” mounts, then turn
them out in that field over there.” Bayle nodded to a meadow beyond
the hedge.

While Bayle
removed the saddles, Helena grabbed the trooper’s hats, knapsacks
and cooking utensils, which joined the bodies in the ditch.

By the time she had finished, her chest burned with the effort
and the emotional toll of what they had done. What
she
had done.

The soldier’s
knife lay where he had dropped it, but she couldn’t bring herself
to return to the ditch, and instead, tucked it into the pocket of
her skirt. A skirt with blood on it, which she intended to burn at
her first opportunity.

The cart no
longer resembled a funeral wagon. The cross and the flowers had
been ripped away, leaving the black cloth draped untidily over the
body.

She stood
transfixed by the shape wrapped tightly in linen; the head, torso
and legs clearly defined, like a large doll with no face.

At first, she
could not reconcile the lifeless object in the flatbed with the
dynamic man she had loved. Then common sense took over, and she
knew this was indeed her Uncle Edmund. Her throat closed and tears
spilled down her face, leaving her breathless and shaking.

Bayle gave a
muttered curse, then flipped the cover back into place,
painstakingly securing the sides. He then helped her back onto her
seat and climbed in beside her.

“Let’s get
Master Edmund home and give him a proper burial,” Helena nodded,
her bottom lip gripped between her teeth.

Alert for the
sound of pounding hooves, she kept a careful eye on the horizon,
holding fast to the seat as the cart bumped over ruts recently
dried out after days of heavy rain.

When they had
gone another mile, the tremor in Helena’s hands turned to
uncontrollable shaking, as she could not get the image of the dead
soldier’s battered skull out of her head.

“We-we killed
two men, Bayle.”

He flicked the
reins against the flank of the nearest horse, his gaze straight
ahead. “Forget them, and tell no one what happened today.
Ever.”

* * *

Helena awoke nestled between
clean sheets in a bedroom she
didn’t recognize. Bleary-eyed from sleep, she
pushed aside the coverlet and stumbled across bare floorboards to
the window, from where she could see undulating green fields lying
beneath the early morning heat-haze.

A scattering of sheep grazed on a
hillside, where the figures of field workers were framed against a
clear blue sky.

She wrinkled her brow in an effort to
think. Reality returned, and with a groan, she turned away. Last
night she and Bayle had come home, but not to her home; not
Loxsbeare.

Tears stung her eyes. Would she ever live
there again? She had left for Somerset days before with a
determination to find her family; battered and weary perhaps, but
whole and alive. To have returned with a corpse and no news of
either her father or brother was an ignominious defeat.

Harsh realism she felt ill-equipped to
handle had thrust away her innocent and happy childhood. How she
longed for her mother’s smile, and Hendry’s laughter; but would
anything be the same after what she had seen?

It was very late when they arrived, and
the household had retired for the night. Exhausted, Bayle had
steadied himself against the cart, one fist pressed to the small of
his back. Close to collapse herself, Helena berated herself for
drawing him into her misguided folly. Would he forgive her
impetuosity someday? Or had he done so already?

She offered neither resistance nor
co-operation as Meghan, roused from her bed and still sleepy, had
peeled away Helena’s dirt-caked gown.

Born in the damp hills of Wales, Meghan
Ffoyle was the same age as Helena’s mother, but looked older. Her
broad cheekbones and near-black eyes betrayed her foreign origins.
When the solitary bachelor Samuel Ffoyle visited Caernarvon in
search of Welsh sheep for his farm more than twenty years before,
he had surprised everyone by bringing more than thirty healthy ewes
back to Devon with him.

Clad in her grubby linen shift, a garment
Helena resolved to burn at the first opportunity, she had collapsed
onto the bed where sleep instantly claimed her.

The room, with its low ceilings with black
oak beams and sparkling white walls seemed too large for one
person. A massive four-poster oak bed stood at one end, and there
was a dresser polished to a rich glow on the other side of the
room.

With a start of surprise, she spotted some
of her own belongings. A wooden chest that had once occupied her
own chamber sat beneath the window. Her prayer book and
tortoiseshell combs lay on a table by the bed, beside a familiar
carved wooden box containing her unimpressive collection of
jewels.

With a sudden urgency, Helena rummaged
through the chest. Her search came up empty. She tried the smaller
box next, expelling a sigh of relief when her hands closed on her
brown leather book. Henry had kept his promise, and her journal was
safe.

She bit her lip, frowning.
Mother must have left Loxsbeare in a hurry, even with all their
things here.
Is this where they were to stay, at the Ffoyles’? And if
so, for how long?

The sound of approaching footsteps in the
corridor sent Helena flying in search of something to wear over her
shift. Before she could locate any of her clothes, the door swung
inwards with a sharp click; it was Susannah, Samuel and Meghan’s
eldest daughter. She carried a pitcher from which rose wisps of
steam, and one of Helena’s own gowns draped over one arm.
Susannah’s looks were similar to her father’s; tall and spare, with
an oval face and high cheekbones, her nut-brown eyes identical to
all the Ffoyle children. She was nineteen years old.

“
Good
morrow Helena,” she greeted her shyly, closing the door with a
swift backward kick.

“
And to
you,” Helena murmured, unsure of what was expected of her. Should
she ask all the questions circling in her head, or wait? Deciding
on practicalities first, Helena discarded the gritty shift that
chafed her skin, and washed luxuriously in the hot
water.

Susannah also shared her father’s tact,
for apart from asking Helena if she slept well, she made no mention
of how she had passed the previous two days.

“
I shall never take cleanliness for granted
again.” Helena’s voice was muffled by folds of the gown Susannah
pulled over her head. “I was so tired last night, I could barely
stand. Is my mother awake yet?”

Susannah
’s hands stilled on the fastenings,
but she did not reply.

Helena smoothed the gown over her hips,
adjusting the bodice, frowning. “Susannah?”

“
Master
Henry is here.” Susannah avoided her eyes as she collected pitchers
and discarded linens. “Your maid, too.”

“
Chloe?”
Helena gasped in surprise. “Why did she not come and help me
dress?”

Susannah turned for the door, her back
stiff. “I will send Father to you.” Before Helena could question
her further, she hurried out.

Puzzled, Helena sat on the bed, listening
with growing unease to a murmur of voices in the corridor outside.
The words were indistinct, but the timbre indicated there was
something wrong. When Samuel finally appeared, Helena jerked to her
feet, though her greeting froze on her lips at the sight of his
distraught face.

“
How are
you this morning, my dear?” He strode to the window and then the
fireplace where he ran a hand along the mantel, but after that
first swift glance when he entered, he avoided her eyes.

A flutter of dread opened like wings in
her stomach, threatened to fly into her throat and choke her. “I-I
am well, Master Ffoyle. I must thank you for allowing us to seek
refuge in your home. Mother and I are-” she broke off when he
flinched.

“
There’s
something, I have to tell you.” He coughed into a fist, opened his
mouth and then shut it again.

Helena waited. The silenced stretched
between them, until her fear overcame her good manners. “Master
Ffoyle, I beg you, tell me what has happened. Apart from us being
thrown out of our own home I mean.” Her harsh laugh fell flat in
the face of his deadpan expression.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
“Lady Elizabeth…your mother…is dead.”

“
What
are you saying?”

What cruel trick was this?
It
couldn’t
be true; Mother had been alive only three days before. Bayle said
the plan was to go to Ideswell, so she would be safe. How could she
be dead?

He made no attempt to reassure her, but
merely stared at the floor.

Incensed, Helena flew at him, clutching at
his coat. Anger gave her strength and she hauled on the heavy serge
and gave him a firm shake that made his eyes widen in shock. “How
could you have let such a thing happen?”

Samuel
’s large hands closed on her upper
arms and held her still, his gaze holding hers. “I cannot tell you
how distressed I am.”

“
How can
she be dead?” Helena’s hands slid down his lapels and she kept
repeating the words in her head.
How can she be dead
?

“
Soldiers came and seized Loxsbeare,”
Samuel said, his voice, calm. “Trained bands, I imagine. They were
an unruly bunch.” His reasonable tone started to grate, though his
eyes pleaded for understanding. “There was a scuffle. Your mother -
she fell.”