A Crowning Mercy (26 page)

She took it upon herself to prepare Campion for confirmation, declaring she could do the task quite as well as Mr Perilly, Lazen's vicar, and, inevitably, the lessons led to talk of God and religion. 'You make it entirely too complicated, child.' Lady Margaret's grey head shook in disapproval. 'God is good, and anything He provides is good. That's all there is to it.'

'All?'

'Of course! Do you truly think He put us on the earth to be unhappy? If you enjoy something then it's a good thing, it comes from God.'

'But what if it hurts somebody?'

'Don't be impertinent, I am instructing you. If it hurts somebody then it's bad and comes from the devil.' Lady Margaret sniffed. 'Sir Grenville Cony obviously comes from the devil, but think of all the good things God has given us. A good meal, a gallop to hounds, a kind deed, marriage, pretty dresses.' She rattled off the ineffable blessings of Almighty God in a confident tone. 'Good books, music, fishing, mulled wine, friends, killing rebels, and a warm house. They're all God's gift, child, and we have to be thankful.'

Campion tried to explain her own fears, fears that sprang from her education that had depicted life as a constant struggle against sin, and taught her that sin pervaded every corner of everyday life. Lady Margaret would have none of it.

'You're being quite tedious, child. You make my Creator sound an extremely unpleasant man, and I won't have it.'

It was a new kind of Christianity to Campion, an acceptance of religion that did not demand torturous struggle and endless self-flagellation. Lady Margaret's Christianity saw the world as God's gift, filled with His love, available to be enjoyed. It was a simple faith, but Campion liked it for that, for she was tired of the endless Puritan wrangles about the triune nature of God, about the doctrine of predestination, about redemption and faith, the splitting of countless hairs in the vicious endeavour to prove that one man was 'saved' while another was not. Lady Margaret's faith was rooted in her conviction that Lazen Castle was a microcosm of God's world, and that the Almighty was a grandly omnipotent type of manorial lord, a kind of heavenly Sir George Lazender. 'My dear Campion, I don't expect the tenants to stand around adoring George! No work would get done! They have to be respectful, of course, if they meet him, and we expect them to come to us when they're in trouble and we do our best to patch things up, but we'd all be in a fine kettle if they spent half their lives worrying what he's thinking and shouting his praises to the sky. They expect things of us, of course, like feasts on Plough-Monday, May Day, harvest and Christmas, but we enjoy those, too! Our tenants are happy and that makes us happy. Why on earth should man be gloomy to make God happy?'

It was an unanswerable question, and so, through the autumn and winter, the fear of God leeched itself from Campion's soul, to be replaced by a more robust and self-reliant faith. She was changing, inwardly and outwardly, and though she knew that she was being changed, it was an incident shortly before Christmas that threw before her a grim reminder of her old life, and made her see herself as she was now compared to the person she had been, and filled her, temporarily, with stark fear.

Sir George had declared for the King, but the declaration was by no means public. The Parliamentary leaders of the county still had hopes of his support and, in an attempt to discover his loyalties, they sent the County's Committee for Assessment to Lazen.

The Committee for Assessment visited each property within Parliamentary lands and levied, according to the property's size, a tax that helped pay the costs of the war. Sir George, the Roundheads decided, would pay the tax if he was still of their persuasion while, if he refused, they would take that as a declaration of enmity.

The Committee for Assessment, delayed by rain, arrived late one afternoon. Sir George, polite as ever, invited them into the hallway of the Old House where they stood, cloaks and scabbards dripping. He offered them ale. They were mostly known to him, men who were neighbours, but might soon be enemies. One or two he did not know, and he needed an introduction. One name interested him. 'Sir George? This is the vicar of Werlatton, the Reverend Faithful Unto Death Hervey.'

Hervey bobbed his head, smiling ingratiatingly at the evidently wealthy owner of Lazen Castle. Faithful Unto Death had still not achieved the fame and fortune he so much desired, though he was pleased to be on the Committee for Assessment, a position he owed to Sir Grenville Cony who had been prompted by Ebenezer Slythe. Faithful Unto Death spoke his usual greeting when visiting houses he hoped to tax. 'May the Lord be in this house.'

'Quite so,' Sir George said.

At that moment Campion came into the hallway, laughing with Caroline. Both girls were dressed for early dinner, Campion brilliant in red silk draped with dyed muslin. She dropped a polite, shallow curtsey in the direction of the visitors.

Sir George did not falter for one second. 'My daughter, Caroline, and my niece, Lady Henrietta Creed.'

The lie alerted Campion. She kept her smile, looked at the visitors, and saw, half lit by the hall lanterns, the lean, sallow face from her past. The Reverend Faithful Unto Death Hervey stared back, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down like a rat trapped in a barley sack. His mouth opened to speak, but Sir George anticipated him. He gestured the girls towards the private parlour. 'I'll join you, ladies, in a moment.'

Campion leaned against the linenfold panelling in the parlour. She had gone pale, and her hand clutched the seal on its chain. 'He recognised me! He recognised me!'

'Who?'

'That priest out there.'

Sir George dismissed her fears. 'My dear! It's impossible! Your hair, your clothes, everything about you is different. Everything! He asked me. I told him you were my niece from Leicestershire and he merely said you reminded him of someone he once knew. Calm yourself!'

Campion would not be calmed. 'He recognised me!'

'He did not. And what if he did? It doesn't matter. Now, I challenge you to a turn at cribbage before you read to Margaret.'

And it seemed Sir George was right. There were no rumours from Werlatton that Matthew Slythe's missing daughter had been seen in Lazen and, as the days passed, Campion forgot her conviction that Faithful Unto Death had spotted her, and even laughed at it.

And, indeed, there was much laughter at Lazen, something there had never been at Werlatton, and it seemed to reach its peak at Christmas when Sir George, lured from his books, supervised the dragging of the yule log to the great hall. The heartbeat of Lazen, that had slowed for winter, quickened in anticipation of the feast that would be held on Christmas Eve. Christmas Day was reserved for the church, though the celebrations were resumed the next day and would last through to Twelfth Night. Christmas was an occasion of grand style at Lazen Castle.

Guests came on Christmas Eve. The Earl and Countess of Fleet, their differences with the Lazenders forgotten for the festival, arrived with Sir Simon and Lady Perrott, Lazen Castle's closest neighbours to the north. A dozen more of the local gentry were present with their families, and the villagers, tenants and servants were invited so that the great hall would be full. It was a night for everyone to enjoy, a night of feasting, laughter, old jokes, drink, and a night that always ended with Sir George singing in the servants' hall.

Campion was excited at the prospect. She wished Toby could have been at the castle, but even without him she was determined to enjoy this Christmas Eve. She chose the blue dress, her favourite, and Lady Margaret came into her room late in the afternoon as Enid, Lady Margaret's own maid, dressed Campion's hair. Lady Margaret looked critically at the dress, then smiled.

'You're looking very lovely, Campion.'

'Thank you, Lady Margaret,'

'Don't thank me, child. Thank your parents.' Lady Margaret watched as Campion's hair was drawn back and the candlelight showed the line of her jaw. It was remarkable, she thought, that such clods as Matthew and Martha Slythe should produce this beauty, for Campion was truly exquisite. Lady Margaret had seen the heads turn. She frowned, unable to let a compliment pass without an attendant criticism. 'Your bust is still too small.'

'You won't let me do anything to remedy that.' Campion smiled at Lady Margaret in the mirror.

'It's your own predicament, child. You shouldn't have married that dreadful man. Don't be shocked tonight.'

'Shocked?'

'George always gets drunk at Christmas. It's a family tradition. He then goes to the servants' hall and sings extremely dubious songs. I can't think where he learned them, they're certainly not in any of his books.'

Enid, her lips holding pins, muttered something about Sir George's father having handed the songs down to his sons.

'I can believe that, Enid.' Lady Margaret sniffed. 'Men always get drunk at Christmas. I've no doubt that Joseph was extremely tiresome when our Lord was born.' On that imperious note she left the room, summoned by loud shouts that announced the arrival of more guests.

Enid put lamp-black cream on Campion's eyelids, a faint touch of rouge on her cheeks, then stood back. 'You do look nice, Miss Campion.'

'It's your work, Enid.' Campion looked at herself in the mirror, a fine piece of silvered glass from Venice, and she was astonished at what she saw. She smiled when she thought what Ebenezer, Scammell or Goodwife might say if they could see her now, her hair hanging in golden rings from her head, decorated with silver and ribbons, her shoulders mostly bare above the silken neckline. She wore something new this day, too, a pair of sapphire ear-rings that Sir George had insisted on her having. Lady Margaret had pierced her ears, freezing them first with ice and then stabbing with a sharpened leather-worker's awl. 'Don't make a fuss, child. A little pain for a lifetime of pleasure. Keep still.'

Campion now hung the seal about her neck, letting it fall on her dress. She frowned at the mirror. 'Are my breasts too small, Enid?'

'You don't want to listen to what she says, miss. It's what Mister Toby thinks what matters.'

'I wish he was here. I thought he was coming.' There was a touch of sadness in her voice. She had not seen Toby since September.

'You'll enjoy it just the same, miss. Everyone does. Now you go downstairs, miss, and don't you drink too much of that wassail bowl. Half a ladle of that and a horse would fall down.'

Music echoed in the passageways of the New House as Campion walked towards the Old. The musicians were in the gallery, their playing still unaffected by the drink that would eventually silence them. Campion walked through the Old House towards the brilliantly lit great hall and stopped at the head of the stairs to look at the splendour.

The hall was lit by scores of candles; in sconces, on tables, and in the two ancient iron-ring chandeliers that had been hoisted to the yellow ceiling. Two great fires burned, warming the throng that laughed, chattered, and manoeuvred friends and neighbours beneath the enormous sprig of mistletoe hanging between the chandeliers. The tables were already set with pewter and earthenware, the gleam of silver at the top table where the gentry would sit.

She looked for Sir George or Lady Margaret, needing allies to help her deal with all these strangers, and she saw them with their special guests at the largest of the two hearths. She started down the wide, polished staircase, then stopped.

Toby had come home.

He stood by the fire, still in travelling clothes with his long boots muddied to the knees, and he paused himself as he put a tankard of mulled wine to his lips. He stared, unbelieving, at the woman who came down the stairs, a woman who seemed to gleam and sparkle in the flame-light, a woman of deep beauty who stared at him, whose face was suddenly suffused with joy, and he knew he was smiling uncontrollably when his mother tapped his shoulder. 'Don't stare, Toby, it's rude.'

'Yes, mother.'

He went on looking at Campion. Lady Margaret, who had engineered this surprise, looked too. A small smile showed on her face. 'I've done rather well with her, don't you think?'

'Yes, mother.' Toby felt a catch in his throat, a shiver of the blood in his body. She was magnificent, her beauty almost frightening.

Sir George looked from Campion to his son, back to Campion, then to his wife. He gave a small, secret shrug and he saw the flicker of amusement on Lady Margaret's face. She knew, they both knew, that there was nothing now to be done. These months in Oxford had not cured Toby, any more than they had cured Campion. Sir George knew he would have to surrender. Only the fires of hell would keep those two apart.

14

London was not a happy city that Christmas. The King's possession of Newcastle meant that coal was desperately short, and though Parliament's allies, the Scots, sent what coal they could, its price was way beyond the means of most citizens. Even when the trees in the royal parks about London had been chopped and cut for firewood and the logs distributed in the city's streets, most of London's quarter of a million inhabitants were still bitterly cold. There was never enough coal and timber to go round, and so the people muffled themselves in what clothes they could, wrapped their faces against the east wind, and watched as the Thames slowly froze above London Bridge. It would be a long, cruel winter.

Christmas should have been a bright spark in that cheerless, bleak winter, but Parliament, in its immemorial wisdom, abolished Christmas.

The Scots were to blame. Parliament's new allies, fervent men from Edinburgh and the draughty houses of the north, declared Christmas to be a heathen abomination, a pagan feast artificially grafted on to Christianity, and the Scots, good Presbyterians all, declared that in a world made perfect by saintly rule there could be no Christmas. The House of Commons, eager to appease their new allies whose armies, though they had achieved nothing yet, might well usher in the glorious Day of the Lord, knuckled their foreheads to the Scottish divines and, in a vote of Parliament, declared Christmas to be no more. To be joyful at Christmas was now not only a sin but also a crime. Truly the Day of the Lord was at hand.