The Licence of War (16 page)

He found himself considering the opportunity Veech had dangled before him. As a small child, Gregory had been fascinated by firelight. He would sit entranced before the hearth; and he required no watching, for unlike other children he never once stuck his little fingers in to get burnt. Draycott felt as fascinated by Veech: the man seemed to possess extraordinary power, even incapacitated as he was. Yet Draycott feared getting burnt.

Draycott woke in darkness to the roll of drums. Damp had penetrated every layer of his clothing, and his feet, though stoutly shod, were numb. He assembled his men for prayers, and a quick breakfast of cheese and more hard biscuit. Then he went to saddle his mare, Betsey, pitying her for the danger she would face, and mounted, to lead the brigade through the fog to their positions by the northerly walls of Basing House. They had to wait for the fog to lift before starting the bombardment.

Around midday a thunderous roar from their artillery was answered by cannon fire from the top of the old section of the house. Draycott’s men were stationed behind another regiment of Trained Bands. When the order came to advance, this regiment, equipped with ladders, ropes, and grenades, set about scaling the walls, a perilous objective, since they were under the constant fire from above. The occupants of the house were shooting off musket balls, and flinging what appeared to be roof tiles at the Parliament troops. Female voices screamed oaths at them, and Draycott saw blood pour from the eye of a man yards away as one of the projectiles hit its mark. Coughing and spitting from the clouds of black smoke that filled the air, dodging as balls whizzed past, he struggled to contain his panicked troops. They were firing too early, cutting down men from the regiment in front of them.

“Hold your fire or aim high,” Draycott yelled, but they would listen neither to him nor to the commands of drum and trumpet. And as the siege wore on, they acted more and more like frightened cattle: some attempted to retreat, some stumbled into those ahead, and still
others were wandering about blindly, having dropped their weapons. By the dimming afternoon, they would advance no further and a mournful cry went up: “Home, home!” Draycott and the other officers tried to rally them, in vain. They were of one mind, and surged away from the house, back towards Cowdrey Down.

Draycott was hopelessly watching them flee, when Harper came charging through the melée. “You lily-livered fools!” he shouted at the men, and to Draycott he barked, “We must turn them about.”

Harper had no better luck. He disappeared into the clouds of smoke, while Draycott was swept along in the tide of retreating men. “Pick up your muskets, for God’s sake,” he urged them. Betsey, who had been quivering at the awful cacophony, reared up with a scream. Draycott lost his seat, thrown into the mud as she raced off after the crowd. He staggered to his feet, pain stabbing his spine, and ran, tripping and slipping over bodies, pushed from behind, until he gained more open ground. The gunpowder could not conceal a slaughterhouse stench, and when he looked down at his coat and breeches and boots, spattered with filth and gore, he was sick to his stomach.

At the camp, he witnessed defeat: soldiers clustered in forlorn groups, and piles of bodies, dead, dying, and wounded. A man tugged at his sleeve, the officer who had spoken to Captain Harper about the men’s woes; Draycott nearly failed to recognise him, his face was so blackened with smoke.

“The Bands are refusing to fight on, Corporal,” he said. “General Waller has said he’d hang any who desert, but I think they’ll be too numerous for him to carry out his threat.”

“Praise Heaven for that,” said Draycott, stupidly glad.

He wept as foolishly when he discovered Betsey, skittish but whole, penned with a bunch of other runaway mounts. As he rubbed her down, he whispered calming noises in her ear, and blessed God for sparing her life and his.

The next morning, he counted seventy of his brigade killed. The regiment in front had suffered more casualties, some self-inflicted as
he knew. Rumours circulated that Parliament had lost over three hundred altogether. In a downpour of sleet and snow, the shivering, bedraggled Bands assembled to march back to London; Waller was withdrawing his own regiments to the garrison at Farnham rather than engage the enemy again. On the ride home, Draycott decided: he would accept Veech’s offer.

Laurence and Price had worked hard, to gratifying result. In roughly a fortnight, Price had memorised and churned out ciphers, and acquired the art of opening and resealing letters, smuggling messages in ingenious places, and concocting invisible inks. Laurence had drilled him as to when and how to hold his tongue or supply misinformation if captured and interrogated. Rather more slowly, Price had learnt the basics of horsemanship. Laurence had been dismayed by Price’s ineptitude in the saddle, but in his past life he had not needed to ride very far, let alone gallop or jump a horse. Laurence had put him through his paces, impressed by his grit, given his many tumbles and bruises. They had also rehearsed manoeuvres of defence and attack. Laurence had shown him some deadlier tricks of the trade: how to be efficient with a ligature or a knife, or with his hands. Despite his thieving, Price was unaccustomed to the use of violence, and clearly alarmed by it.

“Scoop out a man’s eyes with my bare thumbs?” he gasped, when Laurence tried to teach him the technique as they grappled together in mock combat on Isabella’s parlour floor. “I could never do it, and I should hope you’ve never had to.”

“Oh but I have, and if it’s you or the other man, you may surprise yourself,” said Laurence, feeling suddenly old.

“Have you … have you ever killed in cold blood?”

“More than a few times – as have some thieves.”

“Not this one,” said Price.

“Then be welcome to the brotherhood of spies, and occasional murderers,” Laurence told him.

——

Price claimed some expertise with a rapier, but confessed to inexperience with a pistol; so that, too, became a part of his training. “Now I think about it, Beaumont, I might do with a few more fencing lessons,” he admitted, at target practice one day in the fields bordering the River Cherwell.

“I’m as bad a swordsman as you are an equestrian, Price,” Laurence said, truthfully. “You must ask his lordship to find you a different instructor.”

Price seemed disappointed. He squinted at the target: a sack stuffed with straw and stuck on a pole, at about the height of a man. “When
can
I meet his lordship?”

“You wanted to wait for your new clothes.”

“They were delivered yesterday morning, while you were sleeping.”

“In that case I’ll arrange an introduction for tomorrow.”

“When do you expect Mistress Savage back?” Price asked, in a casual tone. Ignoring the question, Laurence loaded another pistol. It was obvious to both of them that Price could not stay in her house once she returned. “Had I a woman as beautiful as she is, I wouldn’t let her out of my sight,” Price carried on. “You know women, Beaumont. It’s not their fault they can’t be trusted. God made them that way, as He made us their superiors. Take my Sue, for example, the wench from the Saracen’s Head.”

“You told Barlow she was a lady, not a wench.”

“I was wrong: she pretended to me she was virgin before she let me bed her. It’s she who’s wrong now if she expects me to marry her. I suppose it’s much like you and Mistress Savage,” Price said, in the same casual way. “I mean … She
is
a lady, but … you wouldn’t marry her, would you?”

Laurence hesitated, as though debating his answer. Then he turned, raised the pistol, and blew Price’s hat clean off his head.

Price gaped at him. “By Jesus, you could have killed me!”

“Yes,” said Laurence. “I could have.”

“C
old enough to freeze a man’s balls!” Price shouted gaily to Laurence, over a vicious wind buffeting them from the north. The ground beneath their feet was crusted with slippery rime, and they were more skating than walking along the street to Digby’s door.

Laurence grabbed him by the collar of his cloak, at which he skidded to a halt. “Wipe the grin off your face. And remember: don’t speak unless questioned, and keep your answers brief and to the point. What comes out of your mouth is more important than those clothes on your back. And don’t smile. His lordship may smile, and he will, but not you.”

Laurence saw in Price’s eyes a hint of the fear he had demonstrated when that ball had sent his hat flying. Earlier in the morning he had paraded before Isabella’s glass in his new doublet and breeches, bowing and saluting effusively to his image. Too late to say anything about the ostentatious purple hue Price had selected for his garments, Laurence had felt obliged to correct his etiquette. Though a quick study in many respects, Price had a great deal to learn about his trade, and the circles into which he was so ambitious to move. In one respect, however, Laurence would let him learn by himself. He had fished repeatedly for Laurence’s opinion of Digby, and Laurence had refused to comment.

Quayle announced to them that his lordship was in conference with the Earl of Bristol. “We can return at a more convenient hour,” said Laurence.

“Oh no, sirs, their lordships will be pleased to receive you,” said
Quayle, peering at Price as he took their cloaks and ushered them into Digby’s chamber.

Digby and his father were seated at one side of his desk, and rose in unison to acknowledge their visitors. As a younger man, Bristol must have been blond and round-faced like his son. Now in his sixties, he was grey of hair and beard, and Laurence detected in his careworn visage a less optimistic temperament. Digby, in contrast, exuded satisfaction.

“Gentlemen,” he said, “what an unseasonably cold day! May I present my honoured father, the Earl of Bristol.”

“May I present to your lordships Mr. Edward Price,” Laurence said, bowing. Price followed suit, as Laurence had taught him.

“Mr. Beaumont, I think we met at Chipping Campden when you were a boy,” said Bristol. “How fares your noble father, Lord Beaumont? And how is your lovely mother?”

“They’re both well, thank you, my lord, and they haven’t forgotten their debt to you.”

“Many years ago, when ambassador to Spain, I gave Lord Beaumont an introduction to his future wife,” Bristol explained to Price.

Price neither smiled nor spoke.

“I gather you have done work for Mr. Beaumont in London, Mr. Price,” Digby said, in a more efficient tone, “and that he has been training you in the skills of an agent. Tell us a little about yourself, sir. What was your former occupation?”

Laurence listened with interest, wondering how inventively Price would lie.

“I had none, my lord,” said Price. “I was living off a small annuity bequeathed to me in my father’s will. I had hoped to enlist in His Majesty’s cavalry a year ago, but I was injured after a fall from my horse, and only mended from it recently.”

“Would you not prefer army service to our more … covert duties?”

“With respect, my lord, I believe that I can best serve His Majesty by serving your lordship, if you will condescend to hire me.”

“On Mr. Beaumont’s recommendation, I shall.”

“Thank you, my lord.” Price looked about to continue, until he caught Laurence’s eye.

“Allow us a moment alone with Mr. Beaumont, sir. Quayle, find Mr. Price some refreshment,” Digby murmured, and Quayle showed Price out. Digby motioned for Laurence to sit. “A keen fellow, sir.”

“He is, my lord,” said Laurence, “but his training is incomplete.”

“You have had over a fortnight with him. He should be ready to take to the stage.”

Laurence deliberated whether to object and cast aspersions on Price’s aptitude or to agree, and let him sink or swim on his own. “I could advise you better as to his readiness, my lord, if I knew what mission you had in mind for him.”

Father and son were quiet. Digby toyed with a button on his doublet, while Bristol studied Laurence with a speculative air.

Digby broke the silence. “Mr. Beaumont, His Majesty said that you above anyone could be trusted with the secrets we are about to reveal to you. He told us that you helped him in the past with a matter of grave importance to himself and to His Royal Highness Prince Charles, in which he still depends on your complete discretion.”

“A matter he would not discuss, even with us,” Bristol put in.

Laurence kept his face impassive. In thanks for concealing the plot against His Majesty’s life, he had been given the highest recommendation; and now he dreaded what secrets he was about to hear.

“I told you of His Majesty’s coming negotiations with certain independents and moderates in Parliament for a reform of the English Church,” Digby continued.

“Yes, my lord, and you said that your intermediary in the negotiations, Major Ogle, might soon be freed from Winchester House. Has Parliament acceded to his release, or is his sentence drawing to a close?”

“Neither, sir,” said Bristol. “The keeper of the gaol, Mr. Devenish, will … 
free
Ogle upon receipt of a warrant from His Majesty, so that Ogle can come to us here and expedite our settlement.”

“Devenish will let Ogle escape?”

“I can rely upon Mr. Beaumont to be direct,” Digby said to his father, laughing.

“But, my lords, can you rely upon Devenish?”

“I think we can, and we must press ahead with our negotiations,” said Bristol. “Pym has not entirely cemented this Solemn League and Covenant with Edinburgh, and even should all go smoothly for him, the Scots will face a battle with the weather if they try to send an army south before the spring. If His Majesty can reach his own terms for a religious compromise with the moderates and independents over Christmastide, the prospect of Scottish troops marching into England would be hailed with far less enthusiasm in Parliament.”

“Pym’s faction may find itself out in the cold,” elaborated Digby. “And Londoners are cooling in their enthusiasm for war. We hear that Parliament has caused much offence by searching house to house for deserters since Waller’s disastrous attempt on Basing House. The City is so upset that it may petition for the return of all of its three regiments, which would leave Parliament’s southern armies in sorry shape.” He paused, evidently waiting for Laurence to speak, but Laurence said nothing. “I forgot to mention to you that, while in London, our Mr. Violet was in talks with some powerful dignitaries and merchants of London’s Corporation, many of whom Parliament is burdening with extortionate taxes,” Digby recommenced. “They might be persuaded to treat directly with the King if they are guaranteed a general pardon and the satisfaction of their debts, in the event of a Royalist victory. London may therefore be ripe for revolt, just when Parliament’s fighting force is at its lowest ebb.”