Merivel A Man of His Time (6 page)

I attempted to doze, but I was seated between the Reverend’s lank bones and the Landowner’s greasy rump, and could find no way to balance myself between these two disparate nubs of flesh, and so felt forced to hold myself upright, as though about to rise from my seat. And then what did the Man of God and the Man of Substance
do
but fall towards each other in their noisy sleep
behind me
, so cutting off absolutely my body’s contact with the seat’s back.

Opposite me were three women, in their middle years and so much resembling each other that I took them for sisters, or even triplets, born in the same hour. What preoccupied them chiefly was the enormous basket of provisions they had brought with them for the journey, and they passed between them legs of Chicken and spiced Meat Patties and salted Radishes and a flask of Ale, consuming everything as though indeed they were never going to eat again.

After a while of their identical gobbling, drinking and munching, I found myself in the grip of a most frightful hunger, and I took the liberty to remind them that, in France, the food was said to be most abundant, diverse and excellently prepared. But they merely reminded me with identical sniffs of disdain that it was ‘as well to be furnished with our own good larder’.

‘True,’ I said, ‘and alas, I myself did not bend my thoughts towards any larder whatsoever for this journey to Dover’, hoping to get from them a small Patty or at least a chicken wing, but they chose to ignore my evident distress. All they offered me was a Radish, which, being bitter, brought to my stomach an unwelcome excess of bile, and I found myself disliking the triplets intensely and feeling sorry for the woman who had borne them.

Some long time after midnight, I (being the only person still awake inside the coach) heard the sound of hooves approaching fast from behind us, and our conveyance began to judder and tremble as the Coachman cracked the whip over the poor nags labouring through the dark, spurring them to something like a gallop. Still the other rider came on, nearer and nearer, and then I heard a shout: ‘Put up! Put up! Or I shall take your lives!’ And I knew that, despite the blessing given out to us by the Reverend, we were now about to lose our lives or our limbs or our
livres
to a Kentish Highwayman.

With much whinnying of the horses, and tearing and grinding of the wheels on the flinty road, the coach was pulled up. This terrifying, lurching stop woke my fellow passengers, who looked about them
like
children, all damp from their dreaming, and searching in vain for their mothers or their nurses.

‘Do not fear,’ said I with a smile. ‘’Tis assuredly only a Highwayman!’

And I must admit it did amuse me to see, by the guttering light of the coach lamps, the Shock on all the faces, and to witness their sudden scrabbling, as they attempted to shovel their possessions further under the seats. One of the triplets thrust her shawl over the food basket, and the Landowner took a stuffed purse from his pocket and tried to slither it down into his boot, but his leg was a mite too fat and the neck of the purse stuck out at the top. The Priest snatched up the cross he wore round his neck, not to kiss it or to beg of it any Divine Help, but only to hide it beneath his robe, because it was made of silver.

I now bethought myself of what I might do, to save what I had taken with me, but I had nothing much concealed about me, all my possessions (which included some fine new clothes I had had made in London) being inside two Valises mounted with all the other baggage on the roof of the coach. And I did not think that Highwaymen, needing to make swift their escapes, could often burden themselves with trunks and boxes. Their prime currency was Currency.

The King’s Letter to Louis XIV, however, in the pocket of my coat, did cause me some concern, for without this I had no entrée into France – and I know that the King’s Signature and Seal may always fetch a goodly price, regardless of the document to which they are attached. I put my hand on the letter, as though putting my hand on my heart, yet at the same time found myself thinking, ‘if I cannot get to France, then I cannot, and there’s an end to it. And nothing matters to me in my life but the safety and happiness of Margaret, and to hear, from time to time, the approving laughter of my Sovereign.’ And, knowing that these thoughts were true beyond all doubt, I suddenly understood why I was not in the least afraid.

Soon enough, the door of the coach was tugged open and a strange visage appeared, with a hat pulled low over its eyes and some foulard or muffler tied about its face, so that it seemed to be All Nose and nothing else.

This Nose sniffed the noisome air of the interior where we sat, its helpless victims, then a gloved Hand reached in and the Hand held a Flintlock Pistol, which it pointed first at me, then at the Priest and lastly at the triplets, who, well-fortified with Ale and Pasties, strove to be brave and stifle their screams.

Then a low Voice spoke: ‘I do humbly beg your pardons, Gents. Ladies, please accept my Apologies. But I am come to a bad pass and have no means to live and pay my debts, except to rob you. I trust you will pardon me.’

‘Ah,’ whispered I to the Priest, whose trembling I could feel all through my being, ‘a very polite and courteous Highwayman.’

‘What’s that? What’s that?’ said the Voice. ‘Who speaks? Is it you, Sir?’

I said nothing, but saw the Flintlock pointed again at me.

‘’Tis no use to think you can escape me,’ said the Voice, and the Nose sniffed back and forth, perhaps smelling the roast Chicken or the fragrant pies. ‘Life deals its cards. I regret the inconvenience. Just give me all your money. That is all I ask. Then I shall be on my way. And you may carry on to Dover.’

Nobody moved. I could still see the purse sticking out of the Landowner’s boot and, as my eyes went to it, so did the Nose move itself downwards and then another Hand appeared and snatched the purse away. The Landowner uttered a little cry of rage and the Priest, seeing that our Highwayman was in Earnest of his Profession, began to babble about being a Poor Man of God, who owned nothing.

‘I am sorry, Reverend,’ said the Voice, ‘I dislike drawing a man’s attention to any Error he may utter. I do not doubt that you strive to be honest in what you say, but I cannot admit that you own
nothing
. Have you not, for instance, a Cross hanging about your neck? And would you not prefer for me to take that Cross than for me to wind the chain on which it hangs about your throat and pull upon it till you breathe no more?’

The Priest’s body, at my side, was now shaking so terribly, I could hear his bones rattling in their sockets and perhaps it was pity for him that caused me to announce: ‘I have a ring, Highwayman! It is a Sapphire and was given to me by His Majesty King Charles, to
atone
for the frequency with which he used to beat me at Tennis. I vouch it is worth more than any other thing in this coach, so why do you not take this jewel, which may get you a hundred
livres
, or ten
pistoles
, which is a deal more than your own
pistol
is worth. Then you may be gone in peace?’

I removed the glove of my right hand and was just about to prise the sapphire ring from my finger when a very vast Noise, as of the Thunder of Jupiter, filled all the air around us and I saw the Nose and the Head on which it sat disappear sideways, followed instantly by the Hand and the Flintlock, and I smelled the stench of sulphur, and in through the open door of the coach came the acrid smoke, which was the smoke of a fired Blunderbuss.

The triplets then gave way to their screaming and the Priest fell forward into the straw. I scrambled to my feet, stepped over the Priest’s recumbent form and went out into the dark. The bitter cold night clamped itself around me and the smoke from the Blunderbuss clouded all vision. But in a very little time it cleared and I could see the Coachman trying to hold the horses to stop them from rearing up and, at my feet, the body of the Highwayman with his head shot clean away. The Guard, holding the Blunderbuss pointed at the Robber’s body, as though wondering whether shooting a man’s head off might not kill him sufficiently, stood there, shaking his head. Then he kicked out at the corpse. ‘I cannot abide them,’ said he. ‘Highwaymen are Vermin. There is not one of them that I do not despatch, whenever I can.’

I am on the Seas now.

In my little cabin (which is so small, it reminds me of the room I inhabited when I worked at Whittlesea – which, in turn, reminded me of my broom cupboard at Bidnold) I am endeavouring to write to Margaret, but after my adventures on the Night Coach, I find myself overcome with weariness, and set aside my letter and lay my head down on my mattress of sacking and fall into a deep sleep.

It is late morning when I wake. The day is very cold, yet the Channel is calm and the rocking of the Ship, which is a Brig taking English Wool to the port of Dieppe, is so gentle that all my fears
about
the sea travel have vanished. Indeed, I suddenly find myself most enamoured of this means of transportation and wonder why I have never attempted it before.

I go up and walk about the deck, and marvel at how the lazy wind is just enough to fill our sails and push us onwards, and I feel glad to be alive and not dead on the Dover Road, with my head shot off. I have seen many deaths in my life as a Physician: death by Consumption, death by Convulsion, death by Wasting, death in Childbed, death by Plague and death by Fire. But I have never before seen a man’s head catapulted from his body by a Blunderbuss and I do not think I shall forget it very quickly.

Yet now I am calm. Out here, on the great ocean, all seems to rejoice at itself: sunlight silvers the wavelets and the wings of the white gulls that follow us, just as they follow the plough, diving for fish in the turning of our wake. The bright pennants flying from the mastheads seem to proclaim a pride in our cargo of wool and in us and in England. And I find my heart to be filled with a ridiculous patriotic joy.

I strut about like a fat pigeon (I am wearing grey) conversing about this or that thing with the Sailors, uncaring if they think me foolish or mad, and regret only that Margaret is not with me, to feel what I feel and be cheered to see that my Melancholy has, for the time being, departed and been replaced with a sudden zeal for living.

All the way to France I am a-dazzle with unexpected happiness. But when the French coast at last appears I feel an onrush of disappointment. It is not that the little port of Dieppe appears uninviting, for it does not. It is merely that I have been held in an embrace so strong by the journey that I find I have relinquished the will to arrive.

My plan had been to hire a carriage and be driven to Versailles without more delay. But as I disembark from the ship I sense that clouding of the air, which always feels to me like the gradual fading of my sight, but which is only the slow coming of the dusk.

And I know that – cold, now, and parted from my mood of joy – I have not the heart to bargain for a carriage, nor to endure
the
long ride to my destination without some hours of sleep. To excuse myself this frailty I think once again of the words of Montaigne, who insists that a man’s happiness may be determined by his knowledge, acquired only by slow Degree, of
his own capabilities
.

I ask about me for the whereabouts of any hostelry in Dieppe, where I might find food and a bed, and I am directed to what the French call an Auberge, a superior kind of Inn, where I am shown to a handsome room. A fire is lit for me by a Chambermaid, with her hair all a-curl beneath her white cap, and I feel glad that I was not robbed of all my money on the Dover Road, so that I can give her a few grateful
sous
.

The room is like a gallery, long and thin, and inhabiting the topmost storey of the building. It is big enough to sleep four or five people, but contains only one bed, curtained with chenille, and having at its foot a quantity of books piled up in a precarious stack. I note within the pile the admirable
Commentarius
upon the way human speech distinguishes us from the Animals by Théodore Bibliander and, on the top of the stack, a copy of the
Fables
of Aesop.

There is also a heavy wooden bureau, set in the middle of the room, as though on an invisible island. On the bureau has been placed an Inkstand and a dozen quills and some pieces of parchment and a painted Globe, showing all that is known of the world. Near the door is a basket of Walking Sticks and a leather cloak, hanging on a nail.

I walk first to the fire and warm myself, till I feel the chill depart from my hands, and I take a covering off the bed and wrap it round me to comfort me. Then I sit down at the bureau and, finding that my rump fits the chair very snugly, say to myself that surely some Ghost of a Scribe resides here, as though he might be a man who, like me, once wrote the Story of his Life and placed it under his mattress, finding it to be a thing of no value. And this notion, no less than the bedcovering, warms my body and my heart.

I send down for some wine and a plate of Oysters. In the distance I can hear the sea, breaking on the shores of France.

My most dear Margaret
, I write,

Now I am truly embarked upon this great and exotic journey of mine. Yet do not imagine that because I am far Away, I am not thinking about Puffins
…

5

MY JOURNEY BY
coach to Versailles was long and, as I travelled the grey road unlit by any sun, with here and there a scattering of poor villages and hovels, it was difficult to believe, seeing much misery around me, that I was moving towards the Great Enormity the King had described to me. But then I remembered that within the word ‘enormity’ lie two meanings: the first being ‘vastness’ and the second being ‘error’.

His Majesty had requested in his letter that I be given Board and Lodging in the Château, but I reflected, as the weary hours passed, that all depended upon depositing my letter into the hands of King Louis, and my knowledge of the workings of Whitehall was sufficient to remind me that Supplicants for favours, bearing letters to which they cling as to little rafts on a wind-dragged ocean, often find themselves waiting many days without food or sleep in the Royal Corridors. (It is related, though I have not seen this, that some waited so long that they
died
there and this, I think, is so pathetic as to wake in a man no other reaction than helpless mirth.)