Copyright

This novel is entirely a work of fiction The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

AVON

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First published in the U.S.A. by Berkley Publishing Group, an imprint of Penguin Group (U.S.A.) Inc., New York, NY, 2011

Published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2012

Copyright © Gillian Bagwell 2011

Gillian Bagwell asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

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Source ISBN: 9781847562593

Ebook Edition © July 2012 ISBN: 9780007443314

Version 2018-07-23

This book is dedicated to the memory of

Khin-Kyaw Maung

I miss you every day.

and

Ross Ireland

You left us far too soon.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Map

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Acknowledgments

Author’s Note

Read on for an extract from her first novel, The Darling Strumpet.

Author the Author

Also by Gillian Bagwell

About the Publisher

CHAPTER ONE

THE AFTERNOON SUN DAPPLED THROUGH THE LEAVES OF THE oak tree. Jane Lane sat in its shade, her back against its stalwart trunk, the Second Folio of Shakespeare’s works open on her lap. She had sneaked her favourite book from her father’s library and taken it out near the summerhouse, where she could read and dream in peace.

Though what need have I to sneak? she asked herself. I am five and twenty today, and if I am ever to be thought no longer a child, it must be so today. Lammas Eve.

“On Lammas Eve at night shall she be fourteen,” her Nurse had said of Juliet Capulet. Jane shared Juliet’s birthday, the thirty-first of July, but Juliet, at not quite fourteen, had found her Romeo, to woo her and win her beneath a moon hanging low in a warm Italian night sky. But not I, Jane thought. I have come to the great age of five and twenty, and but one man has stirred my heart, and that came to naught. An old maid, her eldest sister, Withy, would say.

What is wrong with me? Jane wondered. Why can I not like any man well enough to want to wed him? It is not as though I am such a great prize. Pretty enough, I suppose, in face and form, but no great beauty. Witty and learned, but those features are of little use in a woman, of little use to a man who wants a wife to be mistress of his estate and mother to his heirs.

What if there will never be someone for me?

She pushed the thought away. Surely there was more to think about, more to do than be merely a wife, exchanging the protection and stability of her father’s home for that of a husband’s.

She looked down again at the book in her lap, opened to The Life of Henry the Fifth, and read over the opening lines spoken by the Chorus, which never failed to thrill her.

O, for a muse of fire, that would ascend

The brightest heaven of invention!

A kingdom for a stage, princes to act,

And monarchs to behold the swelling scene.

Yes, that was what she wanted. A swelling scene, full of romance and adventure, not this dull life in the Staffordshire countryside. She read on.

Then should the warlike Harry, like himself,

Assume the port of Mars, and at his heels,

(Leash’d in like hounds) should famine, sword, and fire

Crouch for employment.

That sort of man would rouse her blood. Sword in hand, armour on his back, astride a great war horse, exhorting his men onward.

Once more, unto the breach, dear friends! …

Cry “God for Harry, England, and Saint George!”

Jane sighed. There was no king in England now. King Charles was, unthinkably, dead, at the hands of Parliament, two years since. The war had raged for years, those who wanted there to be no king had won, and now Oliver Cromwell ruled. The king’s twenty-one-year-old son, Charles, the exiled Prince of Wales, had been crowned as king in Scotland at the beginning of the year, but Jane’s father and brothers and cousins, the neighbours and the newsbooks, whether Royalist or Parliamentary in sentiment, did none of them expect to see a king upon the throne of England again.

Jane’s family had mingled with kings since time out of mind. An ancestor of hers had come into England with William the Conqueror more than six hundred years earlier, and Lanes had gone crusading with Richard the Lionheart a century after that, and fought at the side of the Lancastrians in the War of the Roses. Jane’s own great-granduncle William Cecil, Lord Burleigh, had been councillor to the great Elizabeth, the Tudor rose that had blossomed from those wars, and in living memory the family tree had borne a Countess of Oxford. And many generations back, Jane herself was descended from King Edward I, called “Longshanks” and “the Hammer of the Scots”.

But the time for kings had gone, and in their place sat a parliament. What a grey and bleak sound that word had, Jane thought. Would she ever in her life feel excitement again?

The thought again raised the agitation that had rumbled at the back of her mind all day. Her brother John’s friend Sir Clement Fisher was coming to dinner, and she rather thought he was likely to ask her to marry him. She didn’t want to, really. It was not that there was anything wrong with him. He had served honourably in the wars. It was just that she felt no stirring of passion when she was with him. But if she said no? What were her chances then?

Jane’s eyes strayed to the southeastern horizon. Somewhere that way lay London. Throughout her childhood, London had seemed a place of magic, and she had longed to go there. When she was ten, the King’s Company of players had given a performance in Wolverhampton, and her father had taken her, all that five miles away, to see them, as a special treat for her birthday. Henry the Fifth, the same play that lay open on her lap. She had never been so excited in her life as when that first actor strode onto the stage and began the speech that ran through her mind today.

Afterwards, she had begged her father to take her to London, that she might see more plays. “Someday,” he had replied, laughing.

But someday had not come soon enough, and when she was sixteen, Cromwell had ordered the playhouses closed, torn down, the plays to be no more. All of Jane’s family hated Cromwell, but she felt an especial malice towards him for that. He had not only killed the king, he had killed all the past kings as well—glorious Harry V; his father, Bolingbroke, who had dethroned poor lost Richard II to become Henry IV; and all the rest of them.

“Jane!” Withy’s voice cut through Jane’s thoughts. There was no time to think of tucking the book away before Withy heaved into view, pink and exasperated in the heat.

“There you are! Reading again.”

The verb held a freight of disapproval. Jane was the youngest of the Lane siblings, and Withy, thirteen years her senior, still seemed to regard her as a naughty child.

“Sir Clement Fisher will be arriving before long. You haven’t much time to make yourself presentable.”

Withy stood looking down at Jane, her broad face damp with perspiration, and Jane could see her own reflection in her sister’s face as clearly as in a mirror. She had pulled off her cap, and her auburn hair was curling untidily around her shoulders. Her skirt was dusty, and her face warm in the sun. She was comfortable, which meant almost by definition that she was not properly dressed for company. Especially Sir Clement Fisher.

“You know right well he’s like to ask for your hand tonight,” Withy said, swatting at a fly that buzzed around her head. “I’d have thought you would want to take some care for your appearance, this night of all nights. You’re not like to have many more offers, you know.”

“Oh, Withy,” Jane protested, but Withy carried relentlessly on.

“You know it’s true. How many suitors—perfectly good men—have you turned away? And for what reasons? Too old, not handsome enough, not learned enough. And now you’re five and twenty, and Sir Clement is about the only Royalist gentleman left within fifty miles. But I suppose there’s something wrong with him, too?”

“There’s nothing wrong with him,” Jane said. “And yet, I cannot bring myself, though I have truly tried, to have any great desire to be his wife. Or anyone’s wife.”

“And, pray, what else is there for you to be?” Withy’s voice rose in impatience. She stood, hands on sturdy hips, waiting for an answer.

“I don’t know,” Jane said.

Withy was right. She could be someone’s wife, and have a home of her own. Otherwise, she would live on in the homes of her brothers and sisters, never going hungry, never wanting for safety or comfort, but never mistress of her own house or her own life, never with money of her own or the means to be anything other than a spinster relation.

“Well,” Withy said. “I beg you to at least not shame the family or discommode Sir Clement. He’s riding all this way for your birthday supper, the least you can do is wash your face and try to look more like a lady than a milkmaid.”

“And so I shall,” Jane agreed, getting to her feet and dusting off the cover of the folio with her sleeve. “But I want to walk first a bit.”

Withy rolled her eyes.

“Well, don’t be long. In faith, I don’t understand you. Any other woman would be counting the hours until supper time.” She twitched her skirts in annoyance at the buzzing fly and trudged away towards the house.

Jane regretted not having asked her sister to take the heavy folio inside, but likely the request only would have brought a scathing remark about the foolishness of having brought the book outside in the first place.

The orchard lay up the slope some quarter of a mile north of the house. Jane had always loved to escape from the rest of the world there, especially in summer, when the scent of ripening fruit permeated the air. Apples, quinces, pears, apricots, plums, cherries. The trees were laid out in rows, each kind of fruit with its distinctive leaves. Many of the trees were ancient, had stood for far longer than the seventy-five years that the present Bentley Hall had sat on the site of a previous house by that name. Some of the trees had newer tops grafted onto old trunks and still did not look all of one piece. As a child, Jane had liked to imagine that fairies lived in the orchard and watched her, and that perhaps if she were quiet and wished hard enough, they might come out, and perhaps even take her back with them to visit their magic realm.

Jane stopped beneath a plum tree with particularly wide and spreading branches that she had loved to climb as a little girl, and which for some reason had always given fruit sooner than the rest of the trees. One perfect plum, deep purple and fat in its ripeness, hung within reach. She plucked it, and setting the book down carefully on the roots of the tree where it would not be soiled, she bit into the fruit. It was warm from the sun and a spurt of juice trickled down her chin as she ate. The flesh was satisfyingly firm but seemed almost to dissolve with sweetness. Jane threw away the stone and licked her fingers clean, then wiped them on her apron before picking up the book. She would go to the end of the orchard before turning back, she decided.

She had only been walking for another minute or so when her eye was drawn to movement down the lane between the trees. An unfamiliar horse was tethered to an apple tree, and beyond Jane saw three caravans, with smoke rising from beyond them. Gypsies.

Jane’s mother grew tight-lipped with outrage at the thought that the wanderers should presume to camp on the family’s property, but from the time she was a little girl Jane had always been fascinated by the Gypsies, moving from place to place, always seeing something new, with nothing to hold them down. This far from the house they disturbed no one, and as far as she was concerned, they were welcome to the fruit they might pick and the stars above Bentley Hall wheeling over their heads for a few nights.

A black-and-white-spotted dog darted out from under one of the wagons, followed by a smaller rust-coloured mongrel that nipped at its heels. From beyond the wagons a donkey brayed. The scent of food wafted on the air. Jane couldn’t see any of the human inhabitants of the camp, but they were probably cooking the meal or tending to the animals beyond the caravans.

The thought of food reminded her that she should be making herself ready for supper and the visit from Sir Clement Fisher. She turned and made her way towards the house, the heavy scent of fruit in her nostrils. The trees in the orchard were so thickly leaved that they blocked the view ahead of her. A stranger would not have known which way to go. Jane was just remembering a time when as a small child she had gone into the orchard to play and got lost, enchanted by the clouds of blossoms overhead that led her deeper and deeper among the gnarled trunks, when she saw a dark-haired young man sitting with his back against one of the trees ahead of her, his legs splayed out in front of him, his eyes closed. One of the Gypsies, without doubt.

He was not more than ten feet away, and what stopped her in her tracks was the jolt of seeing that one of his hands was in motion in his lap, grasping a stalk of vivid ruddy flesh. Jane had never seen a human phallus and her first thought was that it looked nothing like the somewhat repellent appendages of dogs and bulls, and the second was that it was far bigger than she had ever thought a man’s member would be.

The sound of Jane’s footsteps on the ground brought the man’s eyes open with a start. His eyes met hers with surprise, but no shame. In fact, he tilted his head to one side and smiled at her appraisingly. His hand had stopped its rapid up-and-down movement and now he stroked himself languorously, luxuriating in the sight of her, it seemed. He had the look of a fawn, that sensuous forest creature, half man, half beast. His dark hair fell in unruly curls around his head; his brown eyes, the colour of hazelnuts, shone on her warmly. His teeth were vivid white against the florid pink of the tongue that ran along them.

All of this had passed in a flash, less than a second, and Jane stood rooted to where she stood as the young man spoke.

“Come, sit on my lap, sweetheart.”

It was an invitation. Not an insult or a taunt or a challenge or a threat. He smiled at her again, his swarthy face flushed and damp, and he opened his hand to show Jane the living wand he cradled.

“Come,” he repeated. “And I’ll make thee gasp and cry out for more.”

Jane felt herself flushing violently, her heart beating in her throat, but she was not afraid. In fact she realised with dismay that she felt a pleasurable thrill at the site of this Gypsy lad, so open in his appreciation at the sight of her, so lazily undisturbed at her intrusion into his solitary pleasure. The realisation that she ought to be shocked struck her, and at last brought movement to her feet.

“I can’t—”

It was absurd, she thought, to be explaining why she couldn’t stay or accept his outrageous offer, and she gathered her skirts and ran from him, away through the trees, his amused laughter ringing in the air.

Out of sight of the young man, Jane slowed to a fast walk. She was shaking. She must calm herself before she reached the house, she thought. She leaned against a tree, willing her heart to slow its pace and her hands to stop their sweating. She felt as though she must bear some visible mark of the encounter, as if Withy or her mother or worse yet Sir Clement Fisher would see as soon as they set eyes on her that she had been touched by some taste of lasciviousness, had given in to the urge as surely as if she had lowered herself onto that purple-headed shaft in the Gypsy’s hand and given herself to him like some Maid of Misrule going to a Jack-o’-the-Green on a midsummer night.

AS JANE CLIMBED THE STAIRS TO HER ROOM, NURSE BUSTLED ALONG the upstairs hall with an armful of clean linen, thwarting Jane’s hope that she would reach her room unseen. Jane flushed at the sight of the stout figure. Nurse had cared for Jane and her siblings and was now tending her second generation of Lanes, the children of Jane’s brother John, and decades of sniffing out mischief prompted her to peer more closely at Jane.

“And where have you been gadding, lambkin? You look as though you’d seen a ghost.”

“Just in the orchard,” Jane said. “It’s warm out there in the sun is all, and I must hurry if I’m to bathe before supper time.”

The reminder about the evening’s birthday celebration and the presence of Jane’s suitor brought a grin to Nurse’s round face.

“Ah, that’s it, then. Thinking about that young man. Well, get you to your room and I’ll have Abigail bring the tub.”

THE TUB FILLED AND ABIGAIL GONE, JANE REMOVED HER CLOTHES, luxuriating in the freedom she always felt when she was released from her tight stays. Her mind went back to the Gypsy lad, and his lazy glance that had raked her from head to toe. She flushed again. He had liked what he had seen, that was clear enough. No man had ever looked at her with such open cupidity and it made her consider herself in a new light.

She went to stand before the long mirror that her father had bought for her at such great cost at Stafford. She had never dared to examine her naked body so closely, and felt a little ashamed, but now she gazed at her reflection, trying to see herself as a lover might. She had always thought her breasts were too small, but they were round and high, her nipples a blushing pink against her creamy skin. She cupped them in her hands, imagining what it might feel like to have a man’s hands on her, firm fingers caressing and kneading.

Her waist was slim, her legs long and firm. The soft thatch of reddish brown hair at the cleft of her legs almost but not quite concealed the secret place beneath. She let her hands drift to her buttocks. Her muscles were smooth and sleek from walking and riding. Unwomanly, she could hear Withy saying, but it was good to feel strong and supple and alive.

She dipped a toe into the tub to test the temperature. It had cooled enough to be pleasantly warm, and she climbed in, leaning her back against the high end. The tub was not long enough to let her straighten her legs, and her thighs fell open. She thought of the laughing young man, the look of intense pleasure that had suffused his face in the instant before he had seen her. Was it possible for a woman to give herself the same pleasure?

She usually forbade herself from feeling anything when she wiped herself after urinating, but she knew the sensations that fleeted at the edge of her touch, and now she gave in to the curiosity building within her. She slipped a hand beneath the water, tentatively touching the forbidden place. The bud at the centre was engorged under her fingers, throbbing and alive. It felt as though it would jump as she moved her fingers over it, letting the water tickle and tease.

She was breathing hard, and let her hand move in circles, delicately, softly. A tremor was building within her. Was this what it was like to be with a man? But that act involved the man’s part, the part of him that melded with a woman. She thought of the engorged flesh bobbing like something alive in the Gypsy’s hand, and imagined what it might feel like to have such a thing inside of her. She slipped two fingers inside herself, and found that she was slippery and warm. She moved her fingers deeply in and out as she let her thumb caress the rosebud at her centre. What had taken her so long to make this astonishing discovery? She wanted the sensation to last forever, but a wave was building inside her that she could not hold back. She pressed her hand hard, deep into her and against herself, and gasped, holding back the cry that she wanted to voice. She was shocked to realise that within this private little earthquake she wanted to be calling his name, whoever he was. Not the Gypsy, not Sir Clement, or any man she had ever met. Some warrior prince perhaps.

The wave crested and passed. She was alone in a tub of warm water and guiltily removed her hand.

Maybe Withy was right. Maybe such men existed only in plays and fairy tales.

DINNER THAT EVENING WAS A FESTIVE AND CROWDED AFFAIR. IN honour of Jane’s birthday and to accommodate the large gathering, the meal took place in the banqueting house that stood to the east of Bentley Hall. Jane had always loved the banqueting house, built in the eccentric Flemish style with high chimneys and dormer windows—a fanciful edifice designed to surprise and delight. Besides those that lived in the family home—Jane and her parents; her oldest brother John; his wife, Athalia; and their nine children; and her brother Richard, only a year older than she—her brothers Walter and William and their wives were there, as well as Withy and her husband, John Petre; her cousin Henry Lascelles; and of course Sir Clement Fisher, seated beside Jane. Her health was drunk and all were in good spirits.

“I have a special gift for you today, my Jane,” her father, Thomas, smiled. The bald top of his head shone pinkly with perspiration, a fluffy cloud of hair standing out above each ear. He handed a little book across the table, and Jane stroked a finger across the soft red calf’s leather binding with gilt lettering.

“Oh, Father! How beautiful!” Jane cried, opening the volume. The title page read Poems: Written by Wil. Shakesspeare, Gent, and on the facing page was an engraved portrait, the eyes looking out at Jane in a peculiar, almost cross-eyed way.

“I thought it would please.” Thomas smiled. “It’s got the sonnets, ‘A Lover’s Complaint’, ‘The Passionate Pilgrim’, and a few poems by Milton and Jonson and others. And it’s a little easier to carry outside to read than the folio!”

John and Athalia had a book for her, too—A Continuation of Sir Phillip Sidney’s Arcadia.

“By Mrs A.W.,” Jane murmured.

“Just published,” John said. “By a lady author, as you can see. Perhaps you’ll become one yourself.”

“I can scarce wait to start reading!” Jane exclaimed, beaming.

“Then I daresay we’ll know to look in the summerhouse should anyone need to find you!” Withy said, to general laughter, passing Jane a length of snowy handmade lace.

There were other gifts—a silk paisley shawl from her mother; yards of fine cloth from her brothers William and Richard; two little purses worked with fine embroidery from John’s daughters Grace and Lettice, aged fifteen and thirteen; and ribbons and garters from the younger girls still at home, Elizabeth, Jane, Dorothy, and Frances.

“I haven’t got anything for you yet, Jane,” her cousin Henry Lascelles called from down the table. He grinned at her and shook a lock of light brown hair out of his eyes. “But come with me to the fair in Wolverhampton next week, and I’ll buy you whatever you like!”

“Hmm,” Jane mused, her eyes twinkling. “A new horse, perhaps, with a saddle and bridle worked in silver?”

“Ha!” Henry shot back. “Perhaps next year.”

“I’ve made something for you, sweeting.” Nurse stumped forward and presented a stout pair of stockings, knitted from heavy grey wool.

“They’re plain, but they’ll keep you warm,” she pronounced. “Not like those silly silk trifles you like.”

“Thank you, Nurse,” Jane said, kissing Nurse’s ruddy cheek and letting herself be enfolded in the capacious bosom. “I will feel even warmer, knowing that you made them just for me.”

“I hope you’ll accept a little something from me, too, Jane,” Sir Clement said.

He reached into the pocket of his dark green coat and pulled out a pair of gloves in fine blue kidskin, which he set beside her plate with a bow of the head. His blue eyes shone at her, a little shy, and Jane was conscious of the family watching her suitor and her reaction to him.

“How lovely,” she said, touching the softness of the leather. “Like the colour of bluebells. Now I shall welcome the first day of frost.”

She met his eyes and smiled. He really was very handsome, she thought. Piercing blue eyes above high cheekbones, a strong jaw, no trace of grey yet in his wavy brown hair, though she knew he was more than ten years older than she. Why did she feel no thrill of happiness and excitement, nothing but a vague wish that the evening was over and done with?

As the meal went on, the news from the north dominated the conversation. The exiled young King Charles had arrived in Scotland the previous summer from the Netherlands, and in recent months had been massing an army.

“I say His Majesty will not push into England now, or indeed soon at all,” Henry declared. “Lambert beat the king’s troops under General Leslie scarcely a month ago, and without more men—many more men—he has no hope.”

“Exactly,” Jane’s brother Richard cried. The faint spray of freckles stood out on his cheeks when he was in the grip of a strong emotion, as now, making him look younger than his twenty-six years. “Which is why I say he will cross the border, and that England will rally to his banner. The Papists in the north and his supporters throughout the country know that the time is now.”

“What say you, Sir Clement?” Thomas Lane asked, and all eyes turned to the guest. He had served as a captain under John, and Jane wondered if he would fight again if it came to it. He took a thoughtful swallow of wine before answering.

“I agree with Richard. Cromwell has divided the king’s forces, and marched on Perth. All is in confusion, but His Majesty may seize some advantage from that by moving decisively now.”

“But he has not enough troops to win,” Henry argued, his voice rising. He, too, had fought in the wars, serving as cornet in John’s regiment. “He must have help from England, but the Royalists who would help him are afraid, have suffered so much already during the wars. John’s house and lands were confiscated! My uncle here had all his horses and cattle seized and sold, the profits going to the Stafford Committee. And did not the villains just assess you once more, Uncle?”

“Yes, indeed,” Thomas said. “A hundred pounds in January.”

His voice was calm, but Jane knew the depth of feeling that lay beneath. Her father had been a justice of the peace, but the title had been stripped from him when the war began and the Lanes had fought on the side of the king, and since then he had regularly been burdened with onerous levies and fines.

“Exactly!” Jane’s brother William cried. He pounded a fist on the table, making the silverware rattle. “Those who are known to be for the king must beg for a pass to travel more than five miles from home, have lost their property, and look fearfully on their neighbours, not knowing who is friend and who is foe, and wondering what might be taken from them next.”

“The more reason we have to stand now,” John said quietly.

At forty-two, he was the oldest of the siblings, and his service as a colonel under the old king gave his opinion further weight. Even his two littlest daughters ceased their whispering, and all eyes turned to him. His blue eyes were grave, and even as he sat still, surveying the gathering, it seemed to Jane that she could see the weight of authority and command on his broad shoulders. A raven’s hoarse cry tore through the tense silence.

“I have stayed at home and been silent long enough,” John said. “If the king crosses the border and calls for his subjects to join him, I mean to go.”

Jane felt a surge of pride as she looked at him. If I were a man, she thought, I would hope to be just such a one as he is.

A babble of voices greeted John’s news.

“Oh, John, no!” Jane’s mother, Anne, cried out. “You served honourably and well for years during the wars. Your duty is to your family now.”

“If you go, I’m with you, John,” Henry said. “When do you think of leaving?”

John glanced at his wife. She had said nothing, but the set of her mouth showed she battled strong emotions.

“It will be no use to go off half-cocked,” he said. “I’ll raise as many men and horses as I can and ensure that we’re well provided, so that when His Majesty summons us we can be of real use.”

“Then put me down as one of yours as well, brother,” Richard said.

“Not you, too, Dick!” their mother cried. “Two from the family is more than enough.”

“I am no child, Mother!”

“But think of the cost!” Anne turned to her husband. “Dissuade him, I pray you, Thomas!”

“Mother, how can you argue that they should not go to the aid of the king?” Jane cried with sudden impatience. “He has need of all the help he can get. It’s the crown—the crown and the future of the monarchy. The chance for wrongs to be righted, and the topsy-turvy world to be set back in place. I’d go myself, was I a man.”

Her mother gave a little cry of fear and horror, and Withy laughed shrilly.

“I think you would, too.”

“The Penderels from Whiteladies might come,” Walter mused, hitching his chair close to John. “And perhaps Charles Giffard from Boscobel.”

“Yes,” John said. “And no doubt men from among our tenant farmers, and many others. We’ll go to Walsall next market day and make our plans known.”

“So openly?” Sir Clement asked. “Do you trust your neighbours?”

“Some of them,” John said.

“But others wish us ill,” Richard spat, “and will surely report to the Stafford Committee anything they take amiss.”

“Then we’ll act quickly,” Henry said, leaping to his feet, “and be gone as soon as we may.”

After dinner, as the ladies prepared to withdraw to the house, Sir Clement stood and walked with Jane to the door of the banqueting house. Her female relatives exchanged significant glances and made themselves scarce.

Wonderful, Jane thought. No private conversation can take place but I will be expected to report the results. Sir Clement smiled, as if understanding her thoughts, and spoke in a low voice.

“Will you not walk with me a little, Jane, now that we have a moment to be alone?”

Jane had known he’d be likely to speak his mind tonight, and had hoped to put off the conversation, for she had no clear answer for him, and no wish to cause him pain. He stood looking down at her, his blue eyes solemn, and she nodded. They strolled towards the house in silence. The western horizon was pale pink, shot with gold, and the first stars were just beginning to twinkle in the deepening blue overhead. A hush hung over the land, and Jane inhaled the scent of blossoms heavy on the breeze. Soon it would be autumn, but tonight was a perfect summer evening and she didn’t want to go inside.

“Let’s sit in the summerhouse,” she said. “No one will disturb us there.”

They sat side by side on an upholstered bench. The men’s voices drifted from the banqueting house, still rising and falling in excited conversation.

Clement took Jane’s hand and looked at it, as though he had never noticed it before.

“So small,” he said. “And yet so strong. You’d make a fearsome soldier, Jane, and I honour your courage and your spirit, no matter what your sister may think.”

“Withy has no good opinion of me, whatever I do.”

“I think you know already what I mean to ask. I’ve long had such admiration and affection for you, and it would make my life complete if you were more to me than a friend, but a cherished partner. Jane, would you grant me the supreme happiness of consenting to be my wife?”

Jane forced herself not to sigh or to withdraw her hand. She looked into his eyes, shining at her in the shadows, kind and calm. Why could she not just say yes?

“You do me great honour, Sir Clement. You possess all the qualities that women prize in a husband, and I probably have no need to tell you that my mother and sisters are all aflutter to hear what they hope will be happy news very shortly. And yet I must ask you to indulge me by allowing me some time to consider.”

“Of course. I have no wish to hurry you.”

His lips were set as if in pain, and Jane’s heart contracted. He was a good man, honourable, brave. What was wrong with her?

“I beg you to tell me,” he said, “if there is some fear that you have, or some flaw in myself that I may mend?”

“No. The flaw is in me. I long for—I know not what. For adventure, I would say, did I want to leave myself open to your mockery.”

“I would never mock you, my dear. I don’t know what adventure you hope for, but no doubt you’re right that I cannot offer you vivid excitement. I’m thirteen years your senior, no dashing young suitor to carry you off. I watched, enraptured, as you turned from a charming girl into a lovely young woman. I offer you my esteem, respect, and love. I can provide for you a comfortable home, even a grand one, if I may say so with modesty. I would protect you, honour you, and endeavour to make our life together as happy as it may be, but more than that I am powerless to give.”

He looked off into the deepening shadows, silent. For God’s sake, give him something, Jane thought miserably.

“That in itself is a world, which any woman should be overjoyed to accept. I shall think on your offer most seriously. May I answer you at Michaelmas?”

“At Michaelmas, then,” he smiled. “And I will possess myself in patience during those two months as best I may.”

“YOU WHAT?” WITHY CRIED.

“Asked him to wait?” Jane’s mother breathed. “Sir Clement Fisher, and you asked him to wait?”

“Jane!” Athalia looked as shocked as though Jane had said she’d stuck a fork into Sir Clement’s hand. “Has John not told you of the house? And the miles of parkland in which it sits?”

“Here are two of your nieces, younger than you, and betrothed!” Jane’s mother scolded. “He does you such honour, and you fling it away!”

“I know!” Jane cried, throwing up her hands. Their words echoed the fears ringing in her head. “I know. He is all that I should want, and yet I cannot make myself love him.”

“Love the deer park,” Withy snorted. “Love for the man may come hereafter.”

LATER THAT NIGHT, WHEN MOST OF THE HOUSEHOLD HAD GONE TO bed, Jane found her father reading in his little study, peering over the rims of his glasses in the flickering candlelight. He looked up as she came in and reached out a hand to her. She took it and sank onto the fat little hassock next to his chair, on which she had spent so many happy hours as a child keeping him company as he worked. During his years as a justice of the peace she had observed in silent admiration as he counselled friends and neighbours and resolved complaints and disputes, most frequently with all parties happy at the outcome.

“You look troubled, sweetheart,” he said, kissing her hand. “What’s amiss? Or do you care to discuss it?”

“Mother and the others are vexed that I asked Sir Clement to wait.”

“Ah, that,” he said, his eyes twinkling.

“And have you not lost patience with me, too, Father? Are you not afraid I’ll end a sad old maid?”

“Never in life.” The love and comfort in his voice soothed her agitation. “And come to that, I’d rather you were happy and unwed than a miserable wife.”

“I wish I’d been born a man.” Jane sighed. “Or at least that I had the choices a man does. Look at Richard—only a year older than me, yet he can set the course of his own life, go where he wills. While I must keep at home and wait, though for what, I know not.”

“I’d not have you other than as you are. Sir Clement is a good man, and if you can be happy with him, he’ll make you a good husband, I have no doubt. But whether you wed or no, you’ll never want for a comfortable home here with us, or with John and Athalia once your mother and I are gone.”

“I know.” Jane squeezed her father’s hand. “What are you reading?” she asked, standing to look over his shoulder.

“Virgil. Something about these times puts me in need of the classics.”

“Nothing but bad in the newsbooks,” Jane agreed. “And though the ancient folk had their share of woes, they somehow seem less dire in rhyming couplets.”

Thomas laughed, his eyes disappearing into the wrinkles around his eyes. “Well put, honey lamb. Now, never fret. We’ll find something to distract your mother with, and let you think in peace.”

CHAPTER TWO

THE DAY AFTER JANE’S BIRTHDAY, SHE FELT AT A LOSS. THE celebration was over and Clement was put off a few weeks. It was what she had asked for, and yet she felt discontent, with herself and the world. What on earth did she want? she wondered, looking at her reflection as she brushed her hair.

“You have a letter, Mistress Jane.” Abigail appeared at the bedroom door, letter in outstretched hand, and Jane took it from her eagerly.

“It’s from Ellen!” Jane cried. “Mrs Norton. Ellen Owen as was.”

“Oh, I hope she’s well,” Abigail smiled, her dark curls bobbing. “I always did like that lady.”

Jane sat on the window seat and broke the seal on the letter. It was not often she received mail, and it made the day seem special. Her dearest friend Ellen had married the previous year and gone to live at her husband’s grand home, Abbots Leigh, near Bristol, a hundred miles away. When Ellen lived nearby, she and Jane had visited each other frequently, sharing their hopes and dreams, and it seemed that Ellen’s dreams had come true. George Norton was everything she had wanted in a husband—handsome, rich, earnest, and above all, passionately in love with her. In November her happiness was to be crowned with the birth of a baby and her letter was full of her joy at impending motherhood.

I feel so peculiar and yet so wonderful that I don’t think I can describe the sensation with any justice. My belly has begun to swell, and with marvel I run my hands over it and know that within lies a copy of my dear George (for I am sure it is a son, and my mother writes that carrying a baby low as I do is a sure sign that the child is a boy). My bosom, too, has grown, though surely it is too early for milk to be there, and though perhaps it is indecent of me to put it to paper, George seems to take even more delight in my body thus than he did when we were first wed.

An image of the grinning Gypsy flashed into Jane’s mind. She wondered what it would be like to lie with a man, and then wondered whether she would ever find out.

Oh, Jane, I wish that you were sitting next to me so that I could whisper to you these thoughts and feelings that I blush to write. Nothing would give me more joy than were you to come to visit when I am brought to bed and remain for some time after the baby is born. Though in name I am mistress here, in truth I feel as if I am still the guest of George’s mother. I have no real friends and long for your company.

I will go, Jane thought. Perhaps Ellen can tell me what I’m waiting for, and whether I’m a fool to wait. There must be some sign she can point to, something that will tell whether I should marry Clement or no.

She ran to find John and discovered him in shirtsleeves in the stables among a crowd of grooms and stable hands. The big stallion Thunder was out of his box, and the gate was open into the stall where the pretty new dappled mare stood, whinnying and jerking nervously at her halter. The men looked embarrassed to see Jane, and she realised they must be about to put the stallion in to cover the mare, but she was so excited at the prospect of the trip that she couldn’t wait.

“Ellen wants me to visit her when she has her baby! I so much want to go.”

The scent of the mare in his nostrils, Thunder blew out a great whuffling breath and reared, and the boy holding his bridle narrowly avoided the slashing hooves.

“Have a care there, Tom.” John turned briefly to Jane, but his attention was on the horses. “You’ll need a pass to travel, you know.”

“Oh.” She had not thought of that. “But surely you can arrange it?”

“I daresay.” He laid a calming hand on the shying mare. “But let’s speak of this later, when I’m at leisure.”

He sounded impatient, and as Jane made her way back to the house, she realised that perhaps it was because the arrangements for her travel would have to be made with the governor of Stafford. John had been governor of that town, as well as nearby Lichfield and Rushall. But Stafford had fallen to the enemy and the Parliamentary colonel Geoffrey Stone, once John’s friend, was now governor, though even the rebel officers regarded John with respect.

She had her own reasons for feeling uneasy about a meeting with Colonel Stone. Just before the war had begun, when she was fifteen, young Geoff Stone, then twenty-three, had begun paying court to her. The matter had not gone so far as an engagement, but Jane had liked him very much, as had her family, and it had been painful and embarrassing for everyone when it became apparent they were on opposite sides of a disagreement that would be settled on the battlefield.

THE NEXT MORNING JOHN POPPED HIS HEAD IN JANE’S BEDROOM door, booted and his coat over his arm.

“I’ll ride to Stafford today and see Geoff Stone. I don’t think he’ll give us any trouble about letting you visit Ellen. Someone must travel with you, though. I’ll ask him to make the pass for you and a serving man, and we’ll settle later who is to go.”

“Thank you,” Jane said, standing on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. “It means so much to me to see Ellen. And I’m just as glad not to have to see Geoff myself.”

John was so much older than she that it was almost like having a second father, Jane thought. And while she revered Thomas Lane for his gentle wisdom, John was a big bluff soldier in his prime, and with him she always felt that nothing could hurt her.

“It’s little enough I can do,” John said. “The wars brought trouble in so many ways, we must find our way back to as many ordinary pleasures as we can.”

That evening he returned with the precious pass, authorising Mistress Jane Lane to travel the hundred miles from Bentley to Abbots Leigh, accompanied by a serving man.

“Colonel Stone asked me to send you his compliments and best wishes for a safe journey,” he said. “He’s a good man, for all that I disagree with him about the governance of the country.”

ON AN AFTERNOON A WEEK LATER, JANE HEARD THE WAGON RUMBLE up the drive and then excited voices in the stable yard. John and her father had set out for Wolverhampton for the weekly market, but they had hardly been gone long enough to accomplish their business. She peered out the window and saw Richard and her cousin Henry listening intently to John, though she couldn’t catch the words.

She ran downstairs and out the door on the heels of her mother and Athalia.

“What is it, Thomas, what’s happened?” her mother cried. Her father turned to them, his eyes burning with emotion.

“King Charles has crossed the border at Carlisle with his army and was proclaimed king at Penrith and Rokeby.”

Jane’s heart thrilled. Something real was happening, after all the rumour and uncertainty.

“How many men does he have?” she asked. “Is it the Scots, or has France or someone sent troops?”

“It’s mostly Scots so far,” John said. “But yesterday the king issued a general pardon and oblivion for those who fought against his father, and is calling on his subjects to join him and fight.”

He took a printed broadsheet from his coat pocket, and Richard pulled it out of his hands.

“Dear God,” Jane’s mother moaned. “More war.”

“But this will be the end.” Richard’s eyes were gleaming. “This is our chance to defeat the rebels for good and all.”

“Let’s not stand here to discuss it,” John said as a groom took the team of horses by the bridles and led the wagon away. “Come inside and we’ll talk.”

AS THE FAMILY GATHERED AROUND THE TABLE, SERVANTS EDGED IN from the kitchen to hear the news.

Jane had seized the Parliamentary Mercurius Britannicus newsbook her father had brought home, and snorted in disgust.

“They’ve set forth in the most alarming terms every invasion of the Scots since 1071. ‘Un-English’, they call those who would join the king, and say they deserved to be stoned.”

“Hardly surprising from that source,” Henry said. “But hear what the king says. Read it, Dick.”

“‘We are now entering into our kingdom with an army who shall join with us in doing justice upon the murderers of our royal father …’”

“It’s really happening!” Jane cried. “He’s coming to take back his throne!”

“‘To evidence how far we are from revenge, we do engage ourself to a full Act of Oblivion and Indemnity for all things done these seven years past, excepting only Oliver Cromwell, Henry Ireton, John Bradshaw, John Cooke, and all others who did actually sit and vote in the murder of our royal father.’”

“That’s only right,” Henry said, to murmurs of agreement.

“‘We do require some of quality or authority in each county where we shall march to come to us …’”

They were all silent for a moment, and then John spoke.

“I’ll go to Walsall tomorrow to begin to form a regiment. We’ll send word around tonight. And we shall hasten to the king’s side as soon as we may.”

Oh God, that I were a man! Jane wished. Then I, too, could rally to his side and fight, instead of sitting here to await the outcome.

AS SUMMER RIPENED, THE EMOTIONAL TEMPERATURE OF ENGLAND seemed to rise. Every day there was more ominous news. The Catholics of Lancashire had failed to rise for King Charles. Parliament ordered the raising of militias in each county. A month’s pay was provided to the militiamen who were flocking to support the Parliamentary army, and the generals Cromwell, Lambert, and Harrison were harrying the king’s forces as he moved southward. The government clamped down, ordering that all copies of the king’s proclamation were to be turned over to the authorities to be burned by the local hangmen. Public meetings were forbidden. The already stringent restrictions on travel were tightened.

“You cannot think of going to Abbots Leigh now!” Jane’s mother cried over supper on a warm evening towards the end of August. “Soldiers everywhere, and thousands of Scots among them!”

“The Scots are with the king, still far to the north,” Jane responded. “It’s the Roundheads and the militias I would run into, and in any case, my pass provides for a manservant. I’ll take one of the grooms with me.”

“That’s scarcely better. John, you must accompany your sister.”

“You know I can’t, Mother.”

“Or you, Dick.” Anne rounded on her youngest son.

“No more can I,” he said, doggedly tearing into a piece of bread. “I mean to join the king as soon as we are provisioned.”

“I’ll get a son of one of our tenant farmers to travel with Jane,” Thomas Lane intervened. “Some great strapping lad who’ll make sure no harm befalls her.”

Jane’s mother shook her head in exasperation. “That’s a step in the right direction. But, Jane, surely Ellen would understand if you cannot come?”

“I would not ask her to understand.” Jane tried to keep the irritation from her voice. “She wants my company, and I would not miss the chance to be with her for anything.”

JOHN, RICHARD, AND HENRY WERE DAILY AT WALSALL, AND THE TROOP of men and horse they would take to the king’s aid was growing as the people of the surrounding countryside took heart at the prospect of his return to the throne. Jane joined her brothers and cousin in the parlour after supper each evening to hear about the events of the day, and shook her head in disgust as she read the latest proclamation, “An Act Prohibiting Correspondence with Charles Stuart or His Party”.

“‘Whereas certain English fugitives did perfidiously and traitorously assist the enemies and invaders of this Commonwealth and did set up for their head Charles Stuart, calling him their king’!”

“The more frightened they are, the harder they strike out,” Henry said, his booted feet propped on a stool before him. John lit his pipe and blew a smoke ring, watching it dissolve into the shadows before he spoke.

“They’ve made it a capital offence to give aid to the king in any form. There will be no middle ground. If we’re defeated, the repercussions will be bloody and terrible.”

“The king has reached Worcester!” Henry crowed a few nights later. “He summons all men between the ages of sixteen and sixty to rally in the riverside meadows near the cathedral.”

Richard tilted the newly printed broadsheet towards the firelight. “He promises the Scots will return home once the war is done. Perhaps that will mollify Mother.”

A few days before the end of August, Jane heard the men return home earlier than usual, and ran down to the kitchen to hear the news. John was bathing his face with water from a bucket near the door. Henry and Richard stood nearby, their faces ashen.

“What’s happened?” she asked, her heart in her throat.

“The worst news we could have hoped for.” John shook his head, drying his face and hands. “The Earl of Derby had stayed in Lancashire to defend against Cromwell’s advance. Cromwell’s men caught up with him at Wigan. It seems he may have escaped, but more than two thousand have been taken prisoner, including the Duke of Richmond and Lord Beauchamp.”

“The enemy had word of where he was,” Henry said, sinking in despair onto a stool. “There must be spies in the ranks. Some of the Scots are abandoning the king now, and making for the border.”

“The king was already outnumbered,” Richard fretted, slamming his fist onto the big worktable. “The battle could come any day. John, we can’t wait any longer.”

“Another two days,” John said. “Mistress Hawkins has promised a dozen horses, and we’ll need every beast we can get.”

“Let me leave tomorrow,” Richard insisted. “With the men and horses we have now.”

Oh, that I could be riding with you, Jane thought.

“Very well,” John said. “Henry and I will follow the day after.”

THE NEXT EVENING AFTER SUPPER JANE SLIPPED INTO THE PARLOUR to find her brothers and cousin huddled together near the hearth, their worried looks and low urgent conversation presaging some further bad news.

“What is it?” she asked.

“Come in and shut the door,” John said. He handed her a printed broadsheet.

“‘We do hereby publish and declare Charles Stuart, son to the late tyrant, to be a rebel, traitor, and public enemy to the Commonwealth of England,’” Jane read. “‘And all his abettors, agents, and complices to be rebels, traitors, and public enemies, and do hereby command all officers civil and military in all market towns and convenient places, to cause this declaration to be proclaimed and published …’”

She let the proclamation drop to the floor, suddenly wishing that she could bar the doors of the house, locking out danger and keeping these men she loved so much safe at home.

“It’s not that I mind risking my life,” Richard said, his cheeks flushed with anger. “But if we fail and are captured, the dogs will take the house, the land, and we’ll not be here to protect Mother and Father.”

I can’t strap on a sword and a pistol and ride to Worcester with them, Jane thought. But there is something I can do.

“I’ll take care of Mother and Father,” she said. Her brothers and cousin looked at her. “And your family, too, John, if it comes to that. You must go.”

“How can you?” Richard shook his head. “Your love won’t feed them nor yet put a roof over their heads if Cromwell’s men burn the house.”

The reference to burning hung heavy in the air. An earlier Bentley Hall had been burned down seventy years ago by the mayor and members of the corporation of Walsall during a dispute over common rights, and during the wars many houses had been destroyed by troops on both sides.

“I can marry Clement Fisher,” she said.

She felt numb and then consumed by panic, as if her air were being cut off. Don’t be stupid, she told herself, swallowing back tears. If they can risk death on the battlefield or scaffold, how can I hesitate? The men were all staring at her, and she squared her shoulders and swallowed the sobs that were rising to her throat.

“If you go, we will stand firm here at home, whatever comes.”

John came to her and wiped a tear from her cheek with his thumb.

“Thank you, Jane. It’s a weight off my mind to think so. But let’s pray the battle ends with the king on the throne, and it doesn’t come to such a pass.”

RICHARD AND PART OF THE NEWLY FORMED WALSALL ROYALIST REGIMENT set off to join the king on the first of September. Cromwell had arrived at Red Hill outside the city walls of Worcester, his New Model Army augmented by local militias from across England, and the battle must begin any day. On the third of September, John and Henry rode northward with another hundred men and horses. The house seemed eerily empty and quiet as the family gathered for dinner.

“It was a year ago today that young King Charles met Cromwell’s forces at Dunbar,” Thomas Lane commented, and Jane shivered, recalling her despair at the news of the terrible rout, and Cromwell’s subsequent subjugation of Scotland.

Jane felt restless all afternoon. She tried to read but found no pleasure in it and could not make herself sit still, so she gave up and went outside. Clouds hung overhead and the air seemed to crackle with tension. She felt lonely, but there was no one to talk to, no one who would satisfy her longing for easy companionship. Maybe she would stay with Ellen for a month or more, she thought. Maybe she would feel happier with a change of scene. And perhaps, a voice at the back of her head whispered, perhaps you will meet a man there.

JANE LAY AWAKE THAT NIGHT, HER MIND AND SPIRIT DISTURBED. SHE had only begun to drop off to sleep when she was startled into wakefulness by the furious pounding of horses’ hooves and dogs barking. She ran to the window. There was no moon, and by the silver starlight she could barely make out fleeting shapes in the blackness as several men on horseback pelted into the yard as though the forces of hell were after them.

“All of them into the stable!” It was John’s voice calling out hoarsely.

“Quick, man, quickly, away!” And that voice was Henry’s, low and urgent. Something must be terribly wrong, that they should be back so soon.

Her heart pounding, Jane threw a heavy shawl around her shoulders and ran downstairs, meeting her parents, Athalia, Withy, and Withy’s husband, John Petre, as they converged in the kitchen just as John slammed the door shut and dropped the bar into place. Henry had collapsed onto a stool at the great table, and was slumped forward, his breath coming in ragged gasps.

“What is it, John?” Thomas Lane asked, striking a flint and lighting the lantern. Its blue glass panes bathed the kitchen in a spectral glow.

“There’s been a great defeat at Worcester,” John said, his face haggard. “We got no further than Kidderminster before we began to meet soldiers fleeing. We left it too late to join the king. The battle started this morning.”

“Richard!” Jane’s mother shrieked. “What of Richard? Is he with you?”

“Alas, no,” John said. “We turned back as soon as it was clear there was no longer a battle to go to.”

“Cromwell’s men are scouring the country for the king’s soldiers even now,” Henry said. “It was all we could do to get back before we met any of them.”

“And the king?” Jane cried. “What of the king?”

John and Henry exchanged glances.

“We heard that he was killed,” John said heavily. “But also that he had been taken prisoner.”

Jane’s heart sank. If young King Charles had been captured, he would surely be executed as his father had been, and the Royalist cause would be lost indeed.

“Everything is chaos.” Jane thought Henry seemed near tears. “All that is certain is that the king’s forces were greatly outnumbered, and the day was lost after fierce and terrible fighting.”

Outside a gust of wind shook the trees, and Jane heard the patter of rain against the window, invisible against the icy blackness.

“I’ll go into Wolverhampton for news tomorrow,” Thomas said at last. “Though I fear me none of it will be good.”

ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT AND INTO THE NEXT DAY IT RAINED. IN the grey light of dawn, Jane stood huddled in her shawl, staring out an upstairs window. A quarter of a mile away, the Wolverhampton Road was thick with the traffic of the disaster. Wounded men limped or were carried by their fellows. The rain beat down relentlessly, turning the road into a sucking stew of mud. Jane hoped against hope that she would see Richard walking up the lane to the house, and prayed that he was alive and unwounded. She turned as John came to stand beside her, unshaven and with dark circles under his eyes. She was startled to see how grey was the stubble on his cheeks.

“Can we not help those poor men?” she asked. “Give them water and food, at least? Perhaps somewhere someone is doing the same for Richard.”

In a short time the bake house behind Bentley Hall was bustling as servants dispensed water, hot soup, bread, and ale to the stream of refugees, along with bread, cheese, sausages, and apples to carry away with them. In the kitchen, the women of the house did what they could for the wounded. Washing away the blood and mud and binding the men’s wounds with strips of linen and herbal decoctions to slow the bleeding and soothe the pain made Jane feel that she was making some difference, and it gave her the opportunity to ask about Richard.

“Richard Lane? No, Mistress, I don’t know him.” The young soldier, one arm in a bloody sling and his face grey with pain and dirt, shook his head. Jane closed her eyes and tried not to imagine Richard’s body stiffening in the cold rain.

“Though to be sure,” the lad continued, gulping water from a tin cup, “by the end it was like hell itself, and I would have been hard-pressed to know what happened to any man.”

“Tell me,” Jane begged. She sat beside him on the bench next to the big kitchen table. Across from her, Nurse was sponging blood from the ragged scrap of flesh that was all that remained of the right ear of a redheaded boy who was doing his best not to cry.

“I was just to the north of Fort Royal, up on the hill,” the young soldier said, “and when the rebels captured the fort, we were cut off from the rest of the king’s forces. Outflanked, and trapped outside the city walls. We tried to get to St Martin’s Gate, but Cromwell’s men—the Essex militia it was—came after us.”

He shook his head, as if trying to puzzle something out, and his voice was hollow as he continued.

“There was no question of capture. They just wanted to slaughter all of us they could. Of course, once they overran the fort, they had our cannons. Men were falling all about me and the dead were huddled in piles against the city walls. By some miracle I reached the gate and got through.”

A heavy rumble of thunder sounded, rattling the windows, and the rain seemed to renew its fury.

“And then?” Jane prompted gently.

“All was confusion. The enemy must have broached the other gates of the city, for they seemed to be coming from all directions. They were riding men down, cutting them down as they fled. I saw the king almost trampled by our own horse, running in so great disorder that he could not stop them, though he used all the means he could.”

“Alas,” Jane said. “Would they not stand and fight?”

“I’m sure most did as well as they were able, Mistress. But by that time even those who still had muskets had no shot, and were trying to hold off the enemy horse with fire pikes—burning tar in leather jacks fixed to the ends of their pikes. Dusk was falling and with it the end of any hope. I fled out the gate, my only thought to head northward.”

He drained the last of the water and stood, slinging his canvas sack on his shoulders.

“I thank you for your kindness, Mistress. And I hope your brother is safe and on his way home.”

Jane heard similar stories throughout the day. The king’s army had known to begin with that they were outnumbered, but fought with the desperation born of the knowledge that today was their only hope. At the fort, at the city walls and gates, in the streets, it had been brutal, exhausting, confusing mayhem, ending in defeat and despair.

“We were beat,” a grizzled sergeant said. “It was not for want of spirit, nor for want of effort by the king. Certainly a braver prince never lived.”

“What does he look like, the king?” Jane asked.

The sergeant blew out his cheeks. “Like a king ought to, you might say. I was proud to look on him, and to be sure, I could tell that all around me felt the same.”

Jane thought of Kent in King Lear. You have that in your countenance which I would fain call master … Authority.

“What else?” she asked.

“He’s a big man, over six feet, and well formed.” He noted the look in her eyes and smiled. “Yes, and handsome, too, lass.” Jane blushed. “Of a dark complexion, darker than the king his father. He was wearing a buff coat, with an armour breastplate and back over it, like any officer, but finer, you know. And some jewel on a great red ribbon that sparkled like nothing I’ve ever seen.”

Although the fight must have been terrible, Jane wished desperately that she could have seen the king.

“He was right there among the men in the battle?” she asked.

“Oh, to be sure, Mistress. He hazarded his person much more than any officer, riding from regiment to regiment and calling the officers by name, and when all seemed lost urging the men to stand and fight once more.”

Exactly like King Henry V, Jane thought.

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;

Or close the wall up with our English dead …

“He had two horses shot from under him, he did.”

Jane could imagine the young king so clearly, and she choked back a sob as she remembered that he might well be dead.

“I was there to near the end, I think,” the old sergeant went on. “When there remained just a few of us by the town hall.”

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers …

“All that kept us going was the word that the king had not been killed or captured, so far as any could tell. It was full dark by then, and I was able to slip away by St Martin’s Gate, which our horse still held.”

MANY OF THE FLEEING SOLDIERS WERE SCOTTISH HIGHLANDERS, the upper part of their great kilts drawn up over their heads against the rain, and Jane fancied she saw in their faces bleak despair that went beyond their hunger, discomfort, and defeat in battle. By midday Parliamentary cavalry patrols thundered by on the now-deserted road, and in the afternoon Jane watched a detachment pass with a string of captured Royalist soldiers, their wrists bound, soaked to the knees in mud.

“What will happen to them?” she asked John.

“The Scots will likely be transported to Barbados, or maybe the American colonies. As slaves, more or less, to work on plantations.”

“Inhuman,” Jane whispered in horror. “And the English?”

“Prison. Likely execution for the officers. The men may be spared their lives.”

“Richard,” Jane said. “It breaks my heart to think where he may be. Wounded, perhaps, lying in some field, wet and hungry and in pain.”

Or worse, she thought, but did not speak the words, as if giving them voice had the power to make them real. John put a hand on her shoulder and pulled her closer to him.

“Let’s not think that yet. It may well be that he escaped in safety and is on his way to us even now.”

He kissed the top of her head, and the familiar scent of him, the pungent smell of tobacco smoke, mingled with his own sweat and a slight layering of horse, made Jane feel calm and safe.

THROUGHOUT THE DAY AND EVENING, NEIGHBOURS CAME TO CALL at Bentley to exchange news.

“A Scottish soldier that passed this morning said he had heard the king had been taken prisoner near sunset,” said John’s friend Matt Haggard from Lichfield. “But another swore he had seen the king with his own eyes well after dark.”

“A Parliamentary patrol stopped at the house just at dawn,” said old Mr Smithton. “The captain said he’d seen the king dead, wounded through the breast by a sword. But he looked like a lying whoreson to me.”

Jane chose to believe what the grey-haired sergeant had heard late in the evening, that the king was still free and unharmed. For to let herself think anything else overwhelmed her with grief and terror.

After supper Jane and her father sat side by side reading before the fire in his little study. His companionship, and the persisting in everyday activities, comforted her, helped her believe that all was well or yet might be. The rain beat down outside, and she tried not to think of where Richard might be. John came to the door, and smiled to see his father and sister look up with identical expectant expressions.

“Mother’s gone to bed,” he said. “And Athalia and the girls.”

“Good,” Thomas said. “Better to take comfort in sleep than worry needlessly.”

Jane was surprised to hear the whinny of a horse outside. She ran to the window and peered out, and in a flash of lightning could make out a rider on the drive, leading a second horse behind him.

“It’s not Richard,” she said.

“Who can that be, now?” her father wondered.

“I’ll see to it,” John said, and to Jane’s alarm he took a pistol from a drawer of the desk before he made his way downstairs. He reappeared a few minutes later with William Walker, an old Papist priest that Jane knew as a friend of Father John Huddleston, the young priest who acted as tutor to the boys at neighbouring Moseley Hall.

“You’re wet to the bone, sir,” Thomas cried. “Come down to the kitchen to dry yourself.”

“I thank you, Mr Lane.” The old man shivered. “But better I ask the favour I’ve come for and be on my way.” He glanced at Jane.

“You can speak before my sister,” John assured him. “And to tell you true, if I send her away she’ll only pester any news out of me once you’ve gone.”

Old Father William smiled at Jane, as a drop of water gathered on his nose and fell to the carpet.

“Well, then. I’ve two horses below, and Mr Whitgreaves asks if you would take them into your stable for the night, and mayhap for a few days.” He lowered his voice. “There’s a gentleman at Moseley who’s come from Worcester fight. He can be hid well enough, but the house lies so close to the road that any strange horses are like to be noted.”

“Of course,” said John, with a glance at his father.

“Maybe this gentleman will know news of Richard,” Jane cried.

“Just what I was thinking.” John nodded. “Of course we’ll take the horses, sir. But as Jane says, the household is in great fear for my brother, who was at Worcester. Pray tell Mr Whitgreaves that I’ll ride over tomorrow night, to learn what I can of the battle, and how we may help his fugitive. But come, let’s get those horses out of sight.”

“Oh, Father,” Jane said as John and the priest disappeared down the stairs. “The poor old man, walking all that long way back to Moseley in the rain.”

“Old he may be, but he’s a man still, and he’ll not melt. He’s doing what he can for our cause. I would I could do more, could have gone with your brothers to the fight.” Jane, standing behind her father’s chair, leaned her head onto his and put her arms around him. The thought of him fleeing from Worcester in the night was more than she could bear.

“I know you’d go to fight, but I’m glad you didn’t. What would we do without you here at home?”

He patted her hand and nodded. “Yes, yes. But it’s your brother I’m worried about.”

“No doubt we’ll hear more tomorrow,” she said.

JANE AND ALL THE HOUSEHOLD PASSED THE NEXT DAY IN A FEVER OF anxiety about Richard. John went into Walsall and returned with newly printed broadsheets.

“‘A Letter from the Lord General Cromwell Touching the Great Victory Obtained Near Worcester,’” Jane read as Henry and her parents listened.

“I’ll warn you, it makes grim reading,” John said, sinking into a chair before the fire in the parlour.

“‘We beat the enemy from hedge to hedge, till we beat him into Worcester,’” Jane read. “‘He made a very considerable fight, and it was as stiff a contest for four or five hours as ever I have seen.’”

“And I make no doubt he’s seen some bad fighting,” John said, his face grim.

“‘In the end we beat him totally. He hath had great loss, and is scattered and run. We are in pursuit of him and have laid forces in several places, that we hope will gather him up.’” Jane read it over again. “Then they haven’t captured the king yet. At least that’s something.”

“Not yet. It’s hard to see how he can escape being taken, though.”

Athalia came in with a mug of something steaming. She brushed a lock of golden-brown hair from John’s forehead as she gave him the drink, and he kissed her hand and smiled up at her, his face tired.

“Here’s another,” Henry said, “‘A Full and Perfect Relation of the Fight at Worcester on Wednesday Night Last.’”

“I don’t want to hear it,” Jane said. “It makes me too angry and sad.”

JANE WAS EAGER FOR NIGHT TO COME SO THAT JOHN COULD MAKE HIS visit to Moseley Hall, and she waited up long after the rest of the family had gone to bed for his return, reading in the kitchen by lantern light. She found it difficult to keep her mind on The Aeneid, and realised that she had been staring unseeing at the same page for several minutes, filled with anxiety about what tidings John would bring. It was near midnight when she finally heard his horse, and ran to the kitchen door to meet him.

“Richard’s alive and unhurt, or was two nights since,” John said as soon as he came in, unwrapping his heavy scarf and hanging his coat on a peg near the hearth.

“Thank God,” Jane cried. “Where is he? Did you learn more news of the battle?”

She added hot water and lemon to brandy and brought mugs to the table for both of them.

“Ah, that warms me,” John said, drinking. “Thank you, Jane. Yes, there is much news. It’s my old commander Lord Wilmot who has taken refuge at Moseley. He was in the thick of the battle, at the king’s side.”

He glanced around, as if spies lurked in the shadows, and lowered his voice.

“Jane, the king is alive and nearby.”

Jane smothered a gasp and leaned closer to John as he continued.

“When it became clear that the fight was lost, the king took flight from Worcester with the remains of his cavalry. A few hundred men, Wilmot said. Most of them headed for Tong Castle, having got word that General Leslie and what was left of the Scots infantry had gone there. Richard went with them, but Wilmot heard that all were taken prisoner before ever they reached Tong.”

Jane felt a cold knot form in the pit of her stomach. Richard a prisoner. He could be dead even now, perhaps shot or hanged with no deliberation or trial. She felt furious at her helplessness.

“And the king?” She spoke so low that she could hardly hear her own voice.

“The Earl of Derby urged the king to make for Boscobel, where Derby had been concealed after his defeat at Wigan. Charles Giffard of Boscobel was with them, though, and said that it had been searched but lately, and that Whiteladies might be safer. So the king, with only a few companions, rode through the night and reached Whiteladies about three in the morning.”

The hairs on the back of Jane’s neck stood up to think of the king being so near. The old Whiteladies priory, now owned by the Giffard family, was only some dozen miles away.

“There are cavalry patrols looking for him,” John continued, his voice rough with exhaustion and emotion. “So the Penderel brothers hid him in the wood nearby, and there he spent the day.”

“Dear God, in the rain.”

“Better wet than captured. Wilmot would not say more than that the king is now being helped by other good neighbours of ours, and with God’s grace will soon be on his way to safety.”

“What will Lord Wilmot do?” Jane asked. “He, too, must be fleeing for his life.”

John’s eyes met hers and he paused before he answered.

“Now must I tell you that we can help him. That you can help him.”

“How can I help him?” she asked in surprise.

“He must get to Bristol, where he can arrange for a boat to take the king to France.” Bristol. Only a few short miles from Ellen Norton’s home.

“My pass to travel.”

“Yes. Wilmot must play the part of your serving man, and ride with you to Abbots Leigh.”

The news took Jane’s breath away. She felt a thrill of fear, but it instantly gave way to excitement. An adventure. Lord Wilmot, friend of the king. She had never met the man, but his name conjured in her mind an image of a handsome and dashing officer. He would sweep her into his arms and together they would ride through peril. Once at Abbots Leigh, he could doff his disguise. By then perhaps he would be smitten with her … Jane checked herself. How ridiculous to be carried off in foolish fantasies, with all that lay at stake.

“Will I wait for Lord Wilmot at Ellen’s house until he has found passage for the king?” she asked. “Or return without him?”

“You’ll not ride alone. It’s far too dangerous, and moreover it would raise questions if you were stopped, especially as your pass is for you and a manservant. I’d go with you but my name and my face are too well known to the rebel commanders, and I’d put you in greater danger still. But we’ll find a way. If you’re willing.” He looked at her searchingly. “You need not do it.”

“Of course I’m willing! How could I do otherwise, when the life of the king is at stake?”

CHAPTER THREE

“YOU CANNOT GO!” JANE’S MOTHER CRIED, HER HANDS FLUTTERING in dismay.

Jane stood at the foot of her bed, folding three pairs of stockings into a nightgown and packing them into a satchel.

“With all those soldiers on the road?” Anne Lane paced, heels tapping on the floorboards, and then swooped to Jane’s side. “And Scots, most of them! You’ll be ravished and murdered.”

“I shall have protection, Mother,” Jane sighed, frowning as she noticed a small tear in the sleeve of her favourite shift. “John will arrange for one of our tenants’ sons to ride with me.”

“Small comfort! He may be worse than the soldiers, for all we know.”

Jane’s heart softened at the sight of her mother’s face, pink with agitation beneath her white cap, and she pulled Anne to sit beside her on the bed.

“Ellen is expecting me. Her first baby! I promised her as soon as she knew that she was with child that I would be there for her lying-in and to keep her company after. I cannot disappoint her.”

Jane’s mother sniffed and dabbed at her eyes with her lace-edged handkerchief.

“I don’t know what John is thinking of. And your father. I should never have considered such a thing when I was a girl, and you may be sure my father and brothers would have had none of it.”

Jane’s favourite uncle, Hervey Bagot, was a colonel in the Royalist army, and his son Richard Bagot had been mortally wounded at the Battle of Naseby. She thought that they would certainly have been in favour of her doing whatever she could if it would save the king, but she merely took her mother’s hand and kissed her cheek.

“All shall be well, Mother. Cromwell’s men are too busy searching for the king to bother with me. And the poor Scots are fleeing for their lives, exhausted and hungry. I would be in more danger if I were a turnip.”

ON SATURDAY NIGHT, JOHN RETURNED TO MOSELEY HALL TO MAKE plans with Wilmot for his escape to Bristol with Jane and to bring Wilmot’s horses back to Bentley. Once more Jane waited for him in the kitchen, sitting at the big table in the middle of the room. She had brought knitting to keep her hands busy, but the activity didn’t still the turmoil of her mind, and she threw down the needles and yarn and went to the window again. The sliver of moon cast a faint silver glow over the stable yard and outbuildings, and all was quiet.

The big case clock in the great hall struck two when Jane finally heard John’s footsteps. She pulled the door open, and he moved heavily as he came in and threw off his coat. His whole aspect was one of despair and worry, and prickles of fear ran down her spine.

“What’s amiss? Is it Richard?”

“No,” he said, pulling a chair close to the fire and warming his hands above the flames. “I have no news of him.”

Jane put a mug of brandy and hot water into his hands and he inhaled the steam and drank before he spoke again.

“The situation is grown more perilous than it was. The king set out for Wales on Thursday night with one of the Penderels, but the crossing of the Severn is guarded by two companies of militia and all the boats have been seized. There was nothing for it but to return last night, and he’s back at Moseley.”

The king, only six miles away, and still in danger. It was like something out of a play, Jane thought.

“Oh, no,” she whispered. “What will he do?”

The firelight flickered orange on John’s face, and it seemed to Jane there were lines around his eyes that had not been there only days earlier. His voice was hoarse when he spoke again.

“Jane, I am loath to say what I am about to because I would not put you in danger, but I can see no other way.”

Jane stared at him. What could he mean?

“The king must ride with you to Abbots Leigh. Not Wilmot, but the king himself.”

The shock was so great that Jane found she could say nothing.

“He’s already disguised himself, Wilmot says, cut his hair and changed clothes with a poor woodsman so that none would know him.”

Jane tried to picture the dashing young king who had rallied his troops at Worcester, grimy and unrecognisable.

“We can clothe him in better apparel, and hope that he’ll pass as your serving man. But, Jane, this is far more dangerous than riding with Lord Wilmot.”

“I must help him if I can.”

John stared into the fire, and shivered despite its warmth. “When the king’s friends parted from him at Whiteladies,” he said, “they begged him not to tell them his plans so they could not be forced to reveal them if they were put to torture. Jane, if you were to be taken … The danger is great.”

Jane swallowed. She was very much afraid at the thought of what might happen to her. But if she did not help the king to escape, surely he would be found and captured soon.

“I’ll do it.”

“Someone else must go with you.”

“Henry.” Jane had always felt that in the company of her cousin Henry she could come to no harm, and she felt the more so now that he was a soldier. She recalled the steely determination in his eyes when he had set off with John the few days earlier that now seemed so long ago, and his bitter disappointment when they had returned in confusion, having left too late to join the battle.

“Yes. Henry would go, and I’ll have less fear knowing that he’s with you.”

“But when shall we go? Surely soldiers will be searching the houses hereabout and are like to find the king?”

“Moseley has a priest hole, so the king is well hidden. But still he must fly soon.”

Jane had been shown a priest hole once, in the house of a Catholic friend. It was a little space, not more than four feet square and three feet high, just big enough to hide a man or forbidden articles such as crucifixes, the entry hatch concealed beneath a close stool in the floor of a closet. It had made her skin creep to think of climbing down into it, with no air and no light save for a candle, and her heart went out to the young king.

“Wilmot will send tomorrow to know if you’ll undertake the journey. Think it over.”

“I don’t have to think,” Jane said, pushing her fears aside. “Nothing could stop me.”

The next day after noontime dinner, John stopped Jane as she was heading upstairs to her room.

“Henry’s in the orchard. Come join us for a little chat.”

She grabbed a shawl and hurried out with him, relieved that Withy and her nose for secrets were nowhere to be seen. Henry was swinging by his arms from the branch of a great apple tree, and drew himself up higher before he dropped to the ground, dusting off his hands on the knees of his breeches. He was almost thirty, but there was something very boyish about the way his whole face was lit at the prospect of adventure, Jane thought.

“I’ll ride to Moseley again tonight,” John said, “and bring Wilmot back so we can make our final preparations, but let’s consult between us now.” He turned to Henry. “Jane’s pass is for her and a manservant, no more. I’m concerned that if I go back to Colonel Stone and ask to add someone else, it will draw attention we’d better avoid.”

“Agreed,” Henry said. “I’ll chance it. If we’re stopped and the king is recognised, the lack of a pass will be the least of our worries.” He grinned at Jane, eyes shining. “Didn’t think when you woke up a few days ago that we’d be saving the king’s neck, did you?”

“No,” Jane smiled.

“Are you sure, Jane?” John asked. “If you’re having second thoughts, better to voice them now.”

“I’m having no second thoughts. And if I were, I’d go through with it anyway. For what other way is as sure to get the king out of danger?”

“Spoken like a true soldier.” Henry tweaked a curl that strayed from Jane’s cap, the same as he had done since she was a little girl and he a dashing older boy. “But it’s as well I’ll be with you, to protect you from the king as much as for anything else.”

“Why, what a thing to say!” Jane cried in astonishment. “What may you mean by that?”

“Only that he’s a man like any other, and used to having his way.”

“Careful, Henry,” John warned.

“John, if she’s to travel with him, she should know to be on her guard.” John shrugged in acquiescence, and Henry continued. “He’s already got a bastard son by a wench on Jersey, and there are whispers that he got at least one child on the daughter of the governor there, too.”

Jane felt a little shock at such licentiousness, but she was more annoyed at the sight of Henry, clearly expecting her to be outraged.

“Brisk work for a lad of twenty-one,” she said coolly. “But I’m sure His Majesty will have more on his mind than attempting to debauch me.”

She smiled inwardly to see that Henry looked disappointed at her lack of reaction.

“It’s too cold to tarry here,” she said. “We’ll talk more tonight. I’m going in.”

HENRY WAITED WITH JANE IN THE DARKENED KITCHEN THAT NIGHT. John had a book of maps that had been prepared for Royalist officers, and Henry studied it by the lantern light.

“An exceeding useful thing to have,” he said. “The maps will save us asking our way. The less attention we bring to ourselves the better.”

Jane paced, going to the window to peer out into the blackness. The pale curved crescent of the moon had risen into view before they heard the clatter of horses’ hooves. A rush of cold air gusted through the kitchen as John came through the heavy wooden door, followed by a stocky figure wrapped in a bulky cloak, and Jane shivered as the reality of what she was planning to undertake hit her.

“My lord, may I present my sister Jane? You know my cousin Henry Lascelles, I believe.”

“Your servant, Mistress. A pleasure to see you, Lascelles.”

As Wilmot pulled off his hat and bowed to her, Jane saw that he was a big man with a spreading paunch, near on forty years old, and nothing like the dashing hero of her imagination. But still he looked the part of a soldier, and Jane knew from John’s service under him that he was a capable and shrewd commander. She brought warm drink to the table and sat down with the men. Wilmot’s buff coat was splattered with mud, the collar of his shirt was grimy, and his unshaven face was stubbled with grey, and Jane remembered that like the king, he had been on the run from Cromwell’s men for five long days.

“Henry will ride with my sister and—your master,” John said, his voice low.

Wilmot nodded his understanding.

“An extra man will not go amiss in case of danger,” John added. “And you and I may be of help, too, my lord. We can give out that we go to visit Clement Fisher at Packington. The way lies in the same direction the others will travel, and we can keep in sight at least through the morning.”

“Well bethought,” Wilmot nodded. “The greatest danger probably lies closest to here, so the more men to hand the better. And I shall be glad to see Fisher again.”

“The situation has fallen out well for our purpose,” John said. “I had planned to send the son of one of our tenant farmers to accompany Jane, and it is such a man your master must feign to be. We’ll provide suitable clothes and instruct him in what he needs to know.”

“I’ve already made arrangements to stop with family at Long Marston on the way,” Jane said, looking at the men’s shadowed faces. “And they’ll not question my having a serving man with me.”

“Long Marston’s a long day’s ride,” Henry said, “but if all goes well we should be able to make it, and to reach Abbots Leigh in another two days’ travel.”

“Good,” Wilmot said. “I’ll ride from Packington, and meet you all at Abbots Leigh.”

“Then we’re agreed,” John said. “We’ll be ready to leave when you think fit, my lord.”

A thrill went through Jane’s stomach. It was really happening. A greater adventure than she could have imagined.

“Let us make it as soon as it may be,” Wilmot said. “The danger grows with every hour. I’ll bring him here tomorrow at midnight, and we’ll leave at daybreak.” He stood and threw his cloak over his shoulders. “Until tomorrow.” He bowed to Jane. “I honour your courage, Mistress. And I know I can speak for our master in giving all of you his profound thanks.”

LATE THOUGH IT WAS, JANE LAY STARING INTO THE DARK, UNABLE TO stop her mind from whirling. She could scarcely believe that before the next day was out, the king would be at Bentley, and that the following morning they would be on their way towards Bristol, riding to save his life and any hope for the future of England’s monarchy. She had never travelled farther than Stafford, less than thirty miles away, and now she was setting out on a journey of a hundred miles, every step fraught with peril to her own life as well as that of the king. Her cat, Jack, lay purring at her side, and she reached down to stroke his head.

“How has it come,” she asked him, “that an undertaking of such moment should rest on my shoulders? Will I be able to surmount the difficulties and terrors that are sure to lie along the way?”

Jack shifted against her, his purring rumbling deep within his chest.

I shall have to, Jane murmured to herself. God give me strength.

THE NEXT MORNING JANE LOOKED OUT HER BEDROOM WINDOW TO see a man hastening to the kitchen door. She recognised him as one of the five surviving Penderel brothers, who lived in and around Whiteladies and served the Giffard family at Boscobel, a few miles away in the woods of Shropshire. The family had fought for the king, and a sixth brother had been killed at the Battle of Edgehill. Jane saw John slip out to the stables with the man, and a few minutes later she heard his footsteps on the stairs. He put a finger to his lips imploring her silence as she opened her door to him.

“John Penderel’s just come from Whiteladies. Colonel Ashenhurst was there last night with a party of soldiers. They’d been told that the king was at the house, and they tore the place apart and used Charles Giffard very roughly.”

“Dear God,” Jane whispered, closing the door and leaning against it in alarm. “The king wasn’t there, was he?”

“No,” John said, sinking onto a chair. “But it maddened them not to find him. A soldier captured after Worcester had led them there, and they beat him badly. They have the scent of the king now, and will hunt until they find him. And look at this.” He dug a folded paper out of his pocket. “It’s being distributed to every parish in England.”

Jane stared at the broadsheet, headed “A Reward of a Thousand Pounds for the Capture of the Traitor Charles Stuart”. A cloud covered the sun outside, and she felt a cold shadow of fear pass over her heart.

“Then we had best get him out while we can,” she said.

“Jane, are you sure?” John came to her side and they stood looking out the window. In the yard below, a servant trundling a barrow of barley towards the brew house stopped to exchange words with one of the grooms, and their laughter drifted upward.

“Yes,” Jane said. “Yes. We cannot turn back now.”

“Very well. Then Lord Wilmot and Whitgreaves will bring him here tonight, and you’ll set off in the morning.”

Jane suddenly wondered when she would return. Maybe with things so unsettled at home she would not linger at Abbots Leigh as she had thought, but return as soon as Ellen’s baby was born.

“Another thing,” John said. “We must keep this between ourselves and Henry now.”

“Doesn’t Father know?”

“He knows about Wilmot’s horses. He may suspect more, but he hasn’t asked and I’ve told him nothing. Nor Mother or Athalia either.” John’s face was grim. “And better we leave it at that. They cannot be forced into betraying information they do not have.”

“Forced?” The image of her aged father and mother brutalised by Cromwell’s men rose to Jane’s mind, and that gave her pause as nothing else had done.

“They’re desperate now to find the king. I know some of these men and I’d like to think they’d use our people civilly, but we cannot count on that.”

“Then Mother and Father shall know nothing,” Jane agreed.

THAT AFTERNOON FATHER JOHN HUDDLESTON ARRIVED ON FOOT looking harried and shaken. John ushered him into Thomas’s little study, nodding to Jane to follow them. As it was a capital offence to be a practising Catholic priest, Huddleston was dressed in the coat and breeches of a country gentleman. He was young and sturdily built, and Jane recalled that he had fought in the wars under the Duke of Newcastle, following in the footsteps of his grandfather, who with eight brothers had raised two regiments for the first King Charles.

Huddleston waited until John had shut the door behind them before he spoke.

“Southall the priest catcher was just at Moseley with a troop of soldiers.”

“The king?” Jane and John spoke at once.

“Is hidden yet.” Huddleston’s voice was barely above a whisper. “The officers accused old Mr Whitgreaves of having been at Worcester, but neighbours gathered and attested that he had never left home. The soldiers were out of humour at having been misinformed, and beat some men who stood up to them.” The priest’s brown eyes were hot with anger.

“Did they not search the house?” Jane asked.

“Mr Whitgreaves did a wise thing. Upon hearing that the soldiers were coming, he opened all the doors of the house to show he had nothing to hide. They searched anyway, but found nothing. One of them promised an ostler working in the stable yard he should have a thousand pounds if he could tell where the king was.”

“Oh, no.” Jane could barely breathe.

“He didn’t know the king was there,” Huddleston said. “And he might not have told if he did.”

“But the offer of so great a reward may prove too terrible a temptation for some poor soul,” John said. “Every moment increases the danger.”

“And the soldiers?” Jane asked, looking from Huddleston to her brother. “Will they come here now?”

“We must be prepared,” John said.

WORD OF THE EVENTS AT WHITELADIES AND MOSELEY SPREAD, AND at supper the entire household seemed on edge, though no soldiers had appeared to search for the king. Jane was lost in thoughts of the next day’s journey and did not at first hear Withy speaking to her.

“Do you hear me, Jane?” Withy repeated, rapping Jane’s wrist sharply with her spoon. “We’ve decided to leave with you in the morning.”

“What?” Jane put her wine glass down hard, sloshing a few drops onto the tablecloth. “I thought you weren’t going home until next week?”

“We hadn’t planned to,” Withy said, shaking her head and dabbing at the spilled wine with her napkin. “But after these past days I’d rather be at home, and I’d prefer the safety of travelling in company than taking to the road on our own.” She speared a piece of meat from her plate and popped it into her mouth.

Jane’s heart sank. Setting off with the fugitive king disguised as a tenant farmer’s son would be difficult enough without Withy travelling along, sure to stick her nose where it had no business. What could she say to dissuade them? She cast a glance at Henry, listening from across the table. He seemed to read her mind.

“If I were you, John Petre,” he said to Withy’s husband, “I’d hold off a few days before taking your wife abroad. By then Cromwell’s men are sure to be fewer on the ground, and the roads will be safer.”

“That’s true,” Jane said.

Withy’s husband opened his mouth to speak, but Withy cut in. “Then why don’t you wait?”

Jane could think of no answer and flushed in consternation, and to her annoyance, a knowing smile crept over Withy’s red face.

“Maybe Jane is in such a hurry because she plans to elope,” she simpered to the table. “It’s not Ellen Norton but some lover she’s riding off to!”

Her scornful laugh made it only too clear that she considered the idea ridiculous, and Jane bit her lip to keep from flying out at her sister with angry words.

“Nonsense. Of course it’s Ellen I’m going to see. How could it be otherwise with Henry along? I would delay my travel myself did not Ellen expect me every day. Of course you’re welcome to ride with us, Withy.”

Withy looked put out at Jane’s capitulation, but only turned to her husband and said, “That’s settled, then. We’ll leave in the morning.”

JANE WENT TO HER ROOM AFTER SUPPER TO FINISH HER PACKING. SHE could not carry much, only what would fit in the saddlebags, and she was debating whether to bring along the book of Shakespeare’s sonnets when there was a quiet knock at the door. John slipped in, shutting the door behind him.

“I’ll be off to Moseley about ten,” he said. “And return with Lord Wilmot and—and the other gentleman. You have the clothes?”

Jane took from a large chest the grey broadcloth suit that had been made as Sunday best for one of the servants but had never yet been worn, and a pair of shoes belonging to Richard, who had the biggest feet in the family.

“Good,” said John. “Those will do well. He can have a bath and shave in the kitchen and sleep in the servants’ quarters, and keep out of sight until we’re on the point of leaving.”

“I’ll make all ready,” Jane said, “and have food waiting when you come back.” She turned back to her packing, but John put a hand on her arm.

“Jane, it would be better if you didn’t see him until morning.”

“But I want to make him welcome and see that he’s comfortable,” Jane said. “It’s little enough to do.”

“I know,” John said. “But if you don’t meet with him tonight, then if it comes to it, you can truthfully claim you never laid eyes on him until he brought out your horse, and you knew not who he was. If we’re discovered, that could be the difference between life and death for you.”

They stood in silence for a moment, listening as the case clock in the hall below struck eight. Fear lurked in the pit of Jane’s stomach, but she looked up into John’s worried eyes and spoke calmly.

“I had rather be hanged for a sheep than a lamb. I’ll heat water for his bath and give him his supper.” She gave a wry smile. “And beg his pardon in advance for the nuisance Withy is sure to make of herself.”

“Well, that can’t be helped. But they’ll part from you before the end of the day. Between you and Henry I’m sure you can keep her off the scent for a few hours.”

IT WAS NEAR MIDNIGHT WHEN JANE HEARD THE SOFT WHINNY OF A horse in the darkness of the stable yard. John was back from Moseley. She could hardly believe that the king would really be in the house in a moment. She lifted the candle to view herself in the mirror above her dressing table. She looked anxious and white-faced, her eyes wide in the darkness of the room. She attempted a smile. Better. She wondered if she should change clothes. She had pondered what to wear. It was the king, after all, whom she would be greeting, and yet she would be meeting him in the kitchen in the middle of the night. She had settled on her favourite gown, a brocade of dusky rose, set off by the lace-trimmed sleeves of her shift. Her bosom swelled at the neckline of the bodice, and she draped a white kerchief around her neck and then tossed it away. It was the king, and she would look as pretty as she could, whatever the circumstances. She tucked a stray curl into place, and crept silently out of her room.

As Jane approached the kitchen door, she could hear men’s voices. She paused to listen, her heart beating fast. John’s voice, quiet and steady, but intense with emotion. Wilmot’s tenor whisper. And a lower voice, speaking only a few words, which could only be the voice of the king.

She took a deep breath and entered the kitchen. The men were huddled near the warmth of the fireplace, their faces eerie in the flickering firelight. She stared with shock at what appeared to be a tall scarecrow standing between John and Lord Wilmot. Beneath a greasy and shapeless grey steeple-crowned hat, bloodshot eyes shone from a face that was freakishly mottled sooty black and greenish brown and creased with sweat and dirt, dark hair hanging lank and damp on either side. A threadbare green coat, too small for the broad shoulders, stretched over a battered leather doublet and ragged breeches, and the stockings of coarse yarn were heavily darned at the knees.

The king it must be, but if Jane had not known otherwise, she would have thought him some desperate beggar or Tom O’Bedlam. The men were looking at her and she collected her wits enough to curtsy deeply.

“You are most welcome, Your—” she began, but the scarecrow hastened to her and raised her, whispering fiercely, “No formalities, I pray you, Mistress. I thank you for your hospitality, but the less said the better for all.”

Jane looked up into the shining dark eyes of the king. She was astonished to see him summon a weary smile, and she found herself smiling back, her nervousness melting away.

“Then I will say only I pray you sit, sir, while I get you some supper.”

Wilmot’s serving man settled himself on a stool by the fireplace and the others sat at the kitchen table, seeming near to collapse now that they were safe inside. Jane drew a pitcher of ale and put it before them with slipware mugs, and then dished stew from the kettle that hung on a hook to the side of the fire. She was pleased at the smile on the king’s face when she set a steaming dish before him, and when she came back a minute later with bread, cheese, and butter, he had already eaten most of the stew.

“Forgive my animal nature, Mistress,” he said, meeting her eyes. “It’s little I’ve had to eat in the last days, and this meal is the best that I can recall in my life, it seems.”

Jane blushed, and took up his empty dish. “Then I beg you let me give you more, sir.”

The king consumed the second plate of stew hungrily while John and Wilmot and Wilmot’s man ate at a slower pace. Jane lit some more candles, and as the light fell on the king’s feet, she was shocked to see that his shoes had been slit around the sides, and that his protruding toes were bandaged and dark with dried blood. What a terrible ordeal he had already passed through in the last few days, she thought, and what unknown dangers lay ahead of him.

“My brother has fresh clothes for you, sir,” she said, setting another loaf of bread upon the table. “And water for a bath is hot and ready.”

“The happiest words I’ve had in a week.” He smiled, and she was pleased that so simple a thing probably was the most welcome gift she could give him at that moment.

“Then I will bid you good night,” she murmured, with a half curtsy.

“And I will see you on the morrow, a changed man.”

Jane turned to go, but the king took her hand and spoke again. “I thank you, Mistress Lane, most humbly, for your kindness and your bravery.”

Jane felt herself lost in his eyes, and was conscious of the other men watching her.

“Not at all, sir,” she murmured. “I’m happy to do whatever I can in your service.”

The king raised her hand to his lips and kissed it, and she felt as though a bolt of lightning had shot through her. She tried to speak but no sound would come, and she could only nod and smile as she fled into the darkness of the hall.

IN BED, JANE LAY LOOKING AT THE STAR-FLECKED NIGHT SKY OUTSIDE her window. She touched the back of her hand, where the king had kissed her. She seemed to feel the imprint of his lips on her skin and shivered. She was excited, but a thrill of terror was roiling her belly. Only a few days ago she had been longing for adventure, but what lay ahead of her was no story out of a book, but a real journey fraught with danger. The plan that had seemed thrilling now felt like madness. The king was a big man, not easily disguised. What hope was there that they could make their way undetected along a hundred miles of roads teeming with enemy troopers, and pass among countless common people for whom a thousand-pound reward would mean a life of security?

Guide us and protect us, Lord, Jane prayed. Make clear our path and cloud the vision of our foes. Preserve the king, that he may live to protect our beloved England. And help me to have the courage to see the journey through, whatever may come.

CHAPTER FOUR

IT WAS STILL DARK WHEN JOHN KNOCKED ON JANE’S DOOR THE next morning. Her stomach felt shaky with nerves as she washed and dressed, and she tried to shut out Withy’s chatter as she breakfasted. Henry seemed in good spirits, which helped to calm her. He would know what to do if trouble came, and of course the king was a capable soldier. All she really had to do was sit behind the king on a horse, she thought. And keep her head about her.

As the first streaks of pink dawn shot through the grey clouds, John came into the dining room, pulling his coat on.

“It’s time you were off,” he said. “Jane, your horse stands ready.”

When Jane emerged from the house a few minutes later, Withy and her husband and Henry were already mounted, and John and her parents stood waiting to bid them farewell. Jane stared. The young man who held the bridle of her grey mare was unrecognisable from the ragged fugitive of the night before. A bath, a change of clothes, and further cutting of his hair had transformed the king. He was strikingly handsome, his face shaved clean and the mottled brown scrubbed away. His dark hair was now evenly trimmed so that it just brushed his jaw and was combed neatly back. If she had not known the truth, she would have regarded him warily as a Roundhead.

The new suit of clothes in grey wool Jane had provided fit his tall frame admirably. His snapping dark eyes met hers as he pulled off his hat and bowed to her, the very picture of a deferential retainer.

“Good morrow, Mistress. William Jackson, your humble servant.”

“Thank you,” Jane replied, probably too curtly, in an effort to conceal her discomfiture.

The king swung himself into the saddle and offered her his arm—his right arm, the wrong one to enable her to mount easily, and there was a moment of awkwardness as she tried to hoist herself into position. John saw the difficulty and managed a laugh as he came forward to help her.

“The other arm, fellow. You must not be awake yet.”

The king ducked his head in apology and offered his left arm.

“I’m sorry, Mistress,” he said easily. “You’re right, sir, I must still be half dreaming.”

Jane heard her mother give a snort behind her and mutter, “Blockhead.”

John helped Jane settle herself on the pillion behind the king, her feet perched on the little planchette that dangled against the horse’s belly. The king sat astride, facing forward and away from her, but she could not help that her side brushed against his back, and she was intensely aware of his presence. He smelled like soap and wool, and she wondered how long it had been before the previous night that he had bathed or put on clean clothes.

At Jane’s side, John spoke quietly.

“Lord Wilmot and I will follow shortly. We’ll catch up to you and keep within sight of you as long as we may before we branch off towards Packington.”

He gave an almost imperceptible nod to the king, and went to stand beside his wife.

“Travel safely, sister. And Henry.”

Henry touched his hand to his hat in salute, and spurred his strawberry roan gelding into a walk, the dappled mare bearing Withy and her husband following.

“Have a care!” Jane’s mother called as Jane’s grey mare fell in behind the other horses. “Go with God!”

And the journey had begun.

THE SKY WAS PEARLY GREY, AND A LIGHT BLANKET OF MIST LAY OVER the fields that stretched away on either side of the road. The calls of sparrows and wrens echoed in the crisp morning air and a breeze stirred the drifts of brown and golden leaves. The horses’ hooves sounded dully on the muddy road, but Jane was grateful that no rain clouds threatened overhead, and it appeared they would have a fine day for their travels.

Henry spurred his horse to a faster walk, and Withy’s husband, John Petre, followed his lead. As the horses quickened their pace, Jane realised that she had never ridden pillion behind anyone but her father or one of her brothers. She was grasping the little padded handhold of the pillion, but to be really securely seated, she needed to hold on to the king in front of her. What to do? Surely she could not simply slip her arms around the royal person, uninvited? The king seemed to sense her quandary, and turned his head over his shoulder to speak low into Jane’s ear.

“Hold tight to me, Mistress Lane.”

The sudden pressure of his back against her shoulder, the warmth of his breath, and the low rumble of his voice sent a tremor through Jane.

“Yes, Your—yes, I will, thank you.”

She reached around shim with both arms and held fast. Her lower body was facing sideways, but of necessity her right breast was pressed against the king. Dear God, she had never been so close to a man before, she thought, and this sudden physical intimacy jolted her into a new awareness of her own body. Her heart was fluttering in her throat and she swallowed hard, wondering if the king was similarly taking note of the sensation of having her close against him.

The road was mercifully free of many travellers at this early hour, and they passed through Darlaston, Pleck, and Quinton without running into neighbours.

As the sun cleared the horizon, the misty light of dawn gave way to a glorious day. The sky arching overhead was a cloudless blue, and it seemed to Jane that the leaves of the trees, radiant in their autumn golds and reds, stood out more clearly than she had ever noticed before. On either side of the road, the stubble fields and red earth rolled away in gentle waves, broken by the lines of dark stone walls.

“The day could not have been finer had we ordered it,” Jane said to herself.

“Mistress?” The king tilted his head towards her inquiringly.

“Oh! I only remarked how splendid the day.”

“It is indeed. My heart soars with hope, I find.”

He glanced ahead to see if they were overheard, but the thud of the horses’ hooves on the clay of the road covered the sound of their voices. A conversation with the king. Jane’s heart soared, too, and she began to sing softly.

“The east is bright with morning light

And darkness it is fled,

And the merry horn wakes up the morn

To leave his idle bed.”

The king laughed with pleasure. “I’ve not heard that since I was a boy.” He joined in for the chorus, his deep baritone a counterpoint to Jane’s treble.

“The hunt is up, the hunt is up

And it is well nigh day,

And Harry the King is gone hunting

To bring his deer to bay.”

The cheerful mood was catching, and the others sang along as Jane and the king continued with the next verses.

“Behold the skies with golden dyes

Are glowing all around;

The grass is green and so are the treen

All laughing at the sound.”

The cool autumn breeze whispered by them, redolent of hay, livestock, and the deep earthy smell of the fields.

When they had been travelling for only an hour, Henry pointed to two figures off in the distance. John and Lord Wilmot, with hawks on their wrists and John’s hounds tumbling and barking around them as they rode through the open fields.

“Excellent,” the king murmured. “Two good men within sight, should we need them.”

THE PARTY HAD BEEN SOME FOUR HOURS TRAVELLING, AND JOHN and Lord Wilmot had only just disappeared from view, when Jane’s horse cast a shoe.

“What a nuisance,” Withy huffed. “Did not this mooncalf Jackson examine the shoes before we left?”

She glared at the king and he dropped his head to avoid her eyes.

“Bromsgrove lies not far ahead,” Henry said swiftly. “A smith can soon put us to rights, and we’ll not lose much time.”

He glanced at the king, and Jane knew they shared her apprehension about stopping and being seen, but there was no hope of riding as far as Long Marston without the horse being reshod.

As they rode into the little village, they came to an inn posted with the sign of a black cross, and the sound of a blacksmith’s hammer rang out from a small smithy behind it.

“We’ll take the ladies inside for some refreshment, Jackson,” Henry said, helping Jane dismount. He handed the king some coins. “Wet your whistle while you wait for the smith, and fetch me when he’s done.”

“Aye, sir,” the king said.

Withy and John Petre were already entering the inn, but Jane hesitated. Would the king know what to do? Had he even been in a smithy before? He gave her a smile and nodded infinitesimally as he led the grey mare towards the stable yard.

Jane turned to follow the others inside, but her eye was caught by a broadsheet nailed to a post before the inn, its heavy black letters proclaiming “A Reward of a Thousand Pounds Is Offered for the Capture of Charles Stuart”. Glancing around to see if she was observed, Jane edged closer and read with a sinking heart.

“For better discovery of him take notice of him to be a tall man above two yards high, his hair a deep brown, near to black, and has been, as we hear, cut off since the destruction of his army at Worcester, so that it is not very long. Expect him in disguise, and do not let any pass without a due and particular search, and look particularly to the by-creeks and places of embarkation in or belonging to your port.”

Jane moved quickly away from the signpost, desperately wondering what to do. Surely the smith, the grooms and ostlers, all the people of the inn and the town had seen the proclamation, and it must be the same in every village through which they would pass. How could they hope to arrive at Abbots Leigh without the king being discovered?

She had to warn the king, she decided. She walked around to the back of the inn, where the sounds of the blacksmith’s hammer had rung out. The privy was likely to be back there as well, she reasoned, and she could use that as her excuse for skulking in the stable yard should anyone wonder.

As she rounded the corner of the inn, she saw that she was already too late. The smith was examining the grey mare’s shoeless hoof, and the king leaned nonchalantly against a post, watching with apparent interest. He glanced up and smiled when he saw her, seeming completely at ease.

Jane could not think what to do, and needed to relieve herself anyway, so she ducked into the little house of office. No ideas had occurred to her when she emerged a couple of minutes later. A bucket of water and a pannikin of soap stood near the outhouse, and she used the excuse of washing her hands to assure herself that nothing disastrous had happened yet.

So far, all appeared to be well. The king was holding the horse’s hoof while the smith fitted a shoe to it. Shoeing the horse should only take another minute or two. If the smith would only keep his eyes on his work, perhaps they would escape without discovery.

Her heart stopped as the king spoke.

“What news, friend?” Jane was astonished at how naturally he had taken on the accent of a Staffordshire country fellow.

“None that I know of,” the blacksmith answered, reaching for a handful of nails. “Save the good news of the beating of those rogues, the Scots.”

Jane gulped in fear, but the king just nodded.

“Are there none of the English taken that joined with the Scots in the battle?”

“Oh, aye, to be sure,” the smith answered, tapping a nail into place. “But not the one they sought most, that rogue Charles Stuart!”

Jane dropped the soap into the bucket, and the king and the smith glanced her way. She dared not meet the king’s eyes, and busied herself with retrieving the soap.

“You have the right of it, brother,” the king said. “And if that rogue is taken, he deserves to be hanged more than all the rest for bringing in the Scots.”

“You speak like an honest man,” the smith grinned. He squinted at his handiwork, and nodded to the king to let go the horse’s foot. “Well, friend, yon shoe should hold you to wherever you’re bound.”

WHEN THEY WERE SAFELY ON THEIR WAY, JANE WHISPERED URGENTLY to the king about the posted proclamation.

“I would have liked to take to that villainous smith with his own hammer,” she fumed.

“I take his words as no indictment of me,” he shrugged. “The people are weary of war, and want only to go about their lives.”

He began whistling “Jog on the Footpath Way”. Jane wanted to say more, to tell him she was quite sure that most of his subjects passionately shared her desire to have him back on the throne, but mindful of Withy and John Petre, she said nothing. They would be branching off towards their home in Buckinghamshire at Stratford-upon-Avon, which they should reach by midday, and then the journey would be less strained.

The ride continued uneventful for another hour or more, when an old woman working in the field by the side of the road called out, “Don’t you see that troop of cavalry ahead, Master?” She seemed to be addressing the king, rather than Henry or John Petre, and Jane looked at her in alarm. Could she have recognised him? The old woman only nodded slowly, an inscrutable smile on her toothless mouth, and, eyes still on the king, tilted her head at the road before them.

Jane’s eyes followed where the old woman indicated, and to her dismay she saw that about half a mile ahead, a troop of fifty or more men and horses were gathered on both sides of the road. Henry and Withy’s husband slowed their horses and came side by side.

“We must go another way,” John Petre said to Henry.

“They’ve seen us already,” Henry objected. “To turn off now will bring suspicion upon us. I think it safer to continue as though we’ve nothing to fear. And we must cross the river here.”

He started forward, but John Petre grabbed his arm and shook his head obstinately.

“You weren’t beaten by Oliver’s men like I was a while back, for no reason but that they suspected me to be a Royalist. I don’t relish more of the same, and I’ll not take Withy into danger.”

Jane could sense the king’s tension. He leaned back and spoke into her ear.

“Lascelles is right. If we turn back now, it will bring them down upon us. We must go forward.” He clucked to the horse and they pulled abreast of Henry.

“Surely we must ride on,” Jane said to Henry urgently.

Withy turned over her shoulder, shaking her head. “You ride where you’ve a mind to, Jane, but we’ll take a different way.”

“But they see us,” Jane pleaded. “Look.”

They were within a quarter of a mile of the troops now. Men sat or sprawled in the shade of trees, their horses munching at feed bags, and faces were turned towards the approaching riders.

John Petre reined to a halt. “The road we crossed not half a mile back will bring us into Stratford by another way. We’ll take that.”

He doubled back the way they had come.

Henry shook his head in frustration but turned his horse, and there was nothing for it but for the king and Jane to follow. Jane fretted inwardly, but she and Henry had no convincing argument for their urgency, and the king could say nothing.

The road was narrow and led into a wood, but John Petre seemed to know where he was going, and when no sound of pursuing hooves followed them, Jane began to relax again. In half an hour the track curved to the right, passed through a tiny hamlet, and the village of Stratford-upon-Avon lay before them. Soon they would be across the river and free of Withy and John Petre.

“Hell and death,” the king muttered as they rounded a bend.

Jane glanced ahead and felt her stomach drop. The narrow road through the village was thick with horses—the same troop of cavalry they had turned off the road to avoid. Jane’s instinct was to flee, but the soldiers had spotted them, and now there was truly no way but forward without giving the appearance of flight. Henry and the king exchanged the minutest glance and nod, and Henry held back the roan gelding and fell into place behind the grey mare.

The troops were just ahead now, and Jane noted with horror that the broadsheet with the woodcut of the king and announcing the reward for his capture fluttered from a post at the side of the road. Her arms tightened around the king’s waist.

The troopers were turning to look at the approaching party. One officer leaned towards another and they exchanged words, their eyes on the king. Henry took his reins in one hand and the other dropped towards his pistol.

Don’t be a fool, Jane thought. If you draw now, we will all die.

There was some shuffling movement among the mounted men. This is it, Jane thought. We’ve not come even a day’s journey, and already we are lost. An officer raised an arm, glancing around him, and she felt the king stiffen, bracing for an attack.

“Give way there!” the officer cried.

John Petre checked his horse, but the officer’s eyes were on his troops.

“Make way there! Way for the ladies!” he called.

The troopers parted, clearing a narrow lane between them, just wide enough for a single horse to pass through. John Petre and Withy were between them now, and Jane could see that Withy was clutching her husband tightly.

“Good day to you, sir,” John Petre greeted the officer as they passed, his voice strained.

“And you, sir,” the officer replied. Suddenly he frowned, and put up a hand. “Hold, sir, if you please.”

His eyes took in Withy and her husband, Jane and the king, and Henry behind them.

“Where do you travel, sir?”

“Home, sir,” John Petre said. “From a visit to my wife’s family.”

He dug in the pocket of his coat and pulled out the pass for his and Withy’s travel. Jane could see that the back of his coat was dark with sweat. Don’t panic, she willed him, and all will be well.

The officer glanced at the paper and handed it back.

“Very good, sir, travel on.”

His eyes moved to Jane and the king and she held her breath. Perhaps the officer would not trouble himself to check to see that all of them held passes. Her stomach tightened as she recalled that Henry had no pass. She and the king were nearly past the officer now, and he was making no move to stop them. But it could be a trap, she thought. The cavalry could easily close in around her and the king, and it would be futile to fight. She felt the eyes of the men on either side of the road following her.

She forced herself to look into the officer’s face, and gave him a bright smile, trying to still the beating of her heart. He swept his hat from his head and bowed.

“Your servant, Mistress.”

She nodded in reply. The smile froze on her face as the officer’s hand went to the pommel of the saddle.

“Hold, fellow.”

The king reined in the horse. John Petre halted ahead, and Henry of necessity stopped as well. They were surrounded now, their way blocked by the mounted cavalrymen ahead and behind them.

The officer glanced at the king and then at Jane.

“I’m sorry to trouble you, Mistress, but I’m obliged to ask if you have a pass for your travels. These are dangerous times for a lady to be abroad without good reason.”

“I—yes,” Jane stammered. “My—my cousin bears my pass.”

She looked to where Henry sat on the roan. Why, oh, why, had she not carried her pass herself?

Henry rode forward, his face pleasantly bland.

“This is the lady’s pass,” he said, reaching into his pocket. “And here is my own.”

Jane held back a gasp of surprise.

The officer glanced at Jane’s pass and then at her.

“You travel to Abbots Leigh, Mistress?”

“Yes, sir.”

“That’s quite a ways from Staffordshire. What might take you so far?”

Jane strove to keep her voice calm. “I go to see a friend, who is shortly to be brought to bed of her first child.”

She knew her face was flushed, and hoped that the officer might interpret it as embarrassment at having to speak of something so indelicate.

“I see.” His eyes flickered down the paper. “Well. I know the hand to be Colonel Stone’s.”

He glanced at Henry’s pass, and then at Henry.

Please, God, Jane prayed. Please let us go on.

The officer shook his head and spoke to Henry. “Well, I suppose Colonel Stone thought he had good reason, though was she my cousin, I’d not risk her safety on the road just now, even with a manservant along.”

“Your concern is much appreciated,” Henry said smoothly. “But I assure you, I’ll let no harm come to the lady.”

The officer brushed away a fly that threatened to land on his face, and shrugged, apparently satisfied.

“Then I’ll detain you no further. And I bid you good day. Mistress.”

He bowed again as the king clicked to the mare, and now other officers were nodding and bowing to her. She forced a smile as they rode forward. And then they were past the soldiers, and ahead of them lay the sparkling water of the River Avon, and the bridge over it.

NOT FAR ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE RIVER, WITHY AND JOHN PETRE’S way southeast parted from the road towards Long Marston, and they took their leave. Jane, Henry, and the king rode on some way in silence, as though fearing they were not truly alone. It was not until they had continued half a mile or more, the open country stretching away on either side of them, that the king finally laughed out loud in relief, and Henry and Jane joined in.

“I’ve never been so frightened in my life,” Jane cried. “I’m glad we were a-horseback, for sure I would never have been able to stay steady on my feet.”

“Amen to that,” said the king.

“Henry, what on earth did you show him?” Jane asked.

“Why, a pass, cousin,” Henry smiled. “Yours was easy enough to copy, I found.”

The king whistled. “Then were you cool, indeed, sir, while the rogue examined a forged pass. But all’s well that ends well. Now that the danger has passed, I have a great hunger, I find. Would it be agreeable to halt for a rest?”

Their saddlebags were packed with a roasted chicken, bread, cheese, and fruit, and they spread a blanket beneath a tree and ate while the horses grazed. Jane felt the tension leave her. She squinted up at the sun slanting through the golden leaves above and breathed in the sharp autumn air, and the king smiled to see her pleasure.

“Well, despite everything, this feels almost like a holiday. An adventure toward, and a fair companion.”

Jane felt herself blushing, but smiled back, and noted the look of surprise, not altogether happy, on Henry’s face.

IT WAS NEARLY DARK WHEN THEY REACHED LONG MARSTON, A VILLAGE of small thatched cottages, and Jane was relieved that they had no trouble finding the home of her mother’s cousin John Tomes and his family, a substantial half-timbered house near the river. As the king took the horses to the stable, the Tomes family appeared to greet the visitors.

“Cousin Jane! Cousin Henry!” Amy Tomes’s round face shone as she welcomed them into the warm parlour. “It’s a weight off my mind to have you safely here. I wondered if you might choose not to travel, what with the grim news from Worcester.”

“Any trouble on the road?” John Tomes’s expression was grave.

“No,” Henry replied. “Plenty of soldiers, but they let us be. And of course we had Jane’s man Jackson with us.”

“A likely-looking lad!” Amy’s blue eyes twinkled at Jane. “He’s just come into the kitchen, and the cook and the maid are already elbowing each other out of the way to stand next to him. I think we’ll bed him down in the stable, away from the field of battle!”

She laughed merrily and Jane felt a twinge of unease. She had reckoned on staving off Roundhead soldiers, not round-heeled kitchen wenches. But at least her cousins accepted the king as her servant without a second thought.

Upon hearing that Richard Lane had been arrested after the battle, John Tomes produced a printed list of prisoners of war.

“It only names officers,” he said. “But perhaps you’d like to see it.”

Jane read over the names—seven pages, closely printed—from Robert, Earl of Carnworth, down through colonels, majors, captains, lieutenants, cornets, and ensigns, and finally “a list of the king’s domestic servants”, including his apothecary, surgeons, and secretaries. Next to many of the names was the notation “wounded”, or “wounded very much”. She shivered, thinking of Richard.

“Richard’s probably well,” John Tomes comforted her. “If they’ve got organised to print a list of the officers, no doubt more news will come soon.”

“Look at this, if you want something of a lighter cast,” Amy urged.

Jane struggled to maintain a neutral expression as she read the heading on the broadsheet, “A Mad Design or Description of the King of Scots Marching in His Disguise.”

“Silly, isn’t it?” Amy asked. “I pray it may be otherwise, but I fear His Majesty must surely have been slain at Worcester, or we’d have heard of his being taken.”

AFTER SUPPER, JANE WENT UPSTAIRS TO THE SMALL ROOM THAT AMY had made ready for her. It was cosy, a fire dancing in the fireplace, and the soft feather bed and plump pillows called to her. But weary and aching though she was, she longed to see the king before she slept. From the window she could see the stable, and the soft light of a lantern shone from it.

It is my duty to see that he is well bestowed, she thought, that he has all he needs, for he can scarce ask for anything himself. But she knew it was more than that. She wanted to feel the warmth of that smile, the bright light of pleasure and appreciation in his eyes when he looked on her, to hear his laugh.

The house was quiet. Henry was in a room at the other end of the hall, and would not hear her if she crept out. And why should she care if he did know? There was nothing wrong in making sure that her sovereign would spend a comfortable night. But she felt secretive, and was glad that all was dark and still as she opened her bedroom door and slipped down the stairs and out into the yard.

The door of the stable was shut and Jane stood for a moment uncertainly before she gathered her courage to knock. The door swung open in a moment, and the king stood there in breeches and shirt, a blanket wrapped around his shoulders.

“Mistress Lane!” He was surprised to see her, she could see, and she felt foolish.

“The night is cold.” She spoke quietly and then dropped her voice to a whisper. “Your Majesty. Is there anything you lack? Were you well fed?”

“It is cold. Pray come in where it is warmer.”

He held the door open for her and she stepped past him. In the golden glow of the lantern she saw that another blanket lay in a nest of straw, and the warmth from the horses made the place comfortable. The grey mare snorted softly to see her, and the king chuckled.

“I’m not the only one pleased to have a visit, I find.”

He grinned down at Jane. She was suddenly intensely aware of the animal warmth of him, his bare skin glowing in the lantern light where his shirtfront fell open on his chest.

“I have clean clothes, shoes that do not torture my feet, a warm place to sleep, and a belly full of good food. I lack nothing but the pleasure of your company for a few minutes. Come, sit with me.”

He gestured to a bale of straw in as courtly a manner as if he were inviting her to sit upon a silken cushion. Jane sat and he dropped into his nest in the straw and smiled.

“Thanks to you, my spirits tonight are higher than at any time during this last hellish week. Perhaps since I left Jersey more than a year and a half ago.”

“But all that time you were in Scotland. Proclaimed king, and with an army at your back.”

The king snorted in disgust. “Proclaimed king, yes, but kept like a prisoner. The only way the Scots would help me was if I agreed to swear to their Covenant, not only for myself but for all Englishmen, which was much against my conscience to do. And they kept me at my prayers from morning till night, and I swear to you that I exaggerate not one jot. Into my very bedchamber they followed me, hounding me with my wickedness. Truly, I thought I must repent me of ever being born.”

“A foul way to treat one’s king,” Jane said.

He shrugged. “I minded it not so much on my own behalf, but they would have me admit the wickedness of my poor martyred father, and that was beyond enduring. But the worst of it was that I was so alone.”

He looked at her as intently as an artist might his subject, and Jane blushed.

“Alone? Surely not.”

“I assure you, yes. For the Scots deemed my dearest friends more wicked than I, even, and would not countenance their presence. I have been a great while without congenial company. To say nothing of the fact that I have scarce looked on a female face or form in more than a year.”

The air between them seemed to quiver. Jane knew she should go, that somehow she had got into dangerous waters, but she could not make herself move. The king stood and came to her and pulled her gently to her feet, and she went to him as if in a dream. She shivered to feel him so near, his desire palpable, and she felt she could hardly breathe as he put his arm, her hand still in his, behind her, and drew her to him. She looked up at him, his dark eyes shining in the flickering light of the lantern, and it seemed the most natural thing in the world when his lips met hers, feeding delicately upon her. Her free hand reached around his neck and she pulled him closer, feeling the roughness of his close-cropped head in her palm. She smelled his scent and the faint musk of horses, mingled with the wood smoke from the fire and the heavy aroma of the tallow candle.

The kiss seemed to last forever but at last the king straightened and looked down at Jane, his hand stroking her cheek.

“I’m sorry, sweet Jane,” he murmured, kissing her hand. “I shouldn’t have, but I was quite overcome. You’d best go now.”

Jane didn’t want to part from him, but knew that he was right. Reluctantly, she stepped back towards the door.

“Good night. May good rest attend Your Majesty.”

“Charles,” he whispered. “When we are alone so, call me Charles.”

IN HER BED, JANE TOSSED FITFULLY, FEELING CHARLES’S HANDS AND mouth on her, recalling his taste and scent and the feel of his body against hers. She longed for him with every particle of her being, wished that he would creep to her bed in the quiet dark, and was quite appalled at the fierceness of her desire and her complete lack of care for any consequences that might follow should things go further between them. Between her and the king.

JANE’S FIRST SIGHT OF CHARLES IN THE MORNING WAS AT THE BREAKFAST table. He came in from the kitchen with a large pitcher, and he caught her eye and smiled as he went to Henry’s side.

“Cider, sir?” he asked.

“Thank you, Jackson, yes,” Henry said.

“Good morning, Mistress.”

Charles’s sleeve brushed Jane’s arm as he reached for her mug, and she felt herself flushing at the sound of his voice and feel of him so close. She kept her eyes on her plate as he poured for her, but felt that Henry had given her a quick and curious glance.

They set off soon after breakfast, with their noon meal packed in the saddlebags so that they could keep from inns and public eating houses until they reached Cirencester that night.

It was a spectacular day, the air crisp and fresh. With Henry riding ahead of them, whistling happily, Charles reached down and pulled Jane’s hand to his lips and kissed it. She tightened her arms around his waist and felt her heart soar. The sky rose in a vast blue arc above them, before them lay a landscape tinged with rosy sunlight, and all things seemed possible.

They soon left the village behind, and rode on between stubbled fields. The beautiful half-timbered houses of Mickleton gave way to meadowland, and then to substantial houses of pale stone as they reached Chipping Campden, its vaulted stone market stall packed with sheep, and a crowd of traders around the market cross. Leaving the town, the road sloped downward to an open valley.

“Beautiful country,” Charles said. “I haven’t been just here before.”

Jane longed to ask him a thousand questions, about his life, his family, his hopes and plans for what he would do once safely out of England, but didn’t want to seem too inquisitive.

“You have seen much of the country, have you not?”

“Yes, some. During the war, of course. And before the war, for most of the year my family moved between Whitehall, Hampton Court, Windsor, and the other palaces not far from London. But during the summers the king my father and my mother would go on progress throughout the country, staying in turn at other palaces and the homes of nobles on their way, and when I was old enough to travel, I joined them.”

Jane imagined the royal retinue making its way around the countryside. “A travelling holiday! Where did you like best?”

The king laughed. “Anywhere that I could get out and ride or swim or play!”

Of course, Jane thought, his memories of those travels were all from when he had been a child. He couldn’t have been more than about twelve when his father’s royal standard had been raised at Nottingham for a battle that both sides had hoped in vain might settle the king’s quarrel with Parliament.

“And during the wars?” Jane asked.

“I was with my father to begin with, headquartered in Oxford, and moved where he moved. Then when I was not quite fifteen, I was made general of the Western Association, and went to take up my duties in Bristol.”

“A general at fourteen?” Jane asked in amazement.

“In name only, to speak truly. My cousin Rupert was really in command, but I learned much from him, and it was the start of making me into a man. And a king.” His voice was sad, and no wonder, Jane thought.

“And then?” she asked.

“Then we lost Bristol, and I moved westward into Cornwall, and then to the Scilly Isles and thence to Jersey, and then to France and the Low Countries. The next time I set foot on English soil was when I crossed the border from Scotland a month ago.”

“But you’ll be back,” Jane whispered fiercely to him. “I know you will.”

“I will,” he nodded, straightening in the saddle. “But God knows when or how.”

They rode on in silence for a little way. Jane watched a flock of sparrows swoop overhead, then plunge and divide, settling on the branches of a large sycamore.

“Will you sing to me, Jane?” Charles asked. “Your good spirits cheer me.”

Jane began to sing “Come o’er the Bourne, Bessy”. Henry slowed his horse to come alongside them, and sang the man’s part as they came to the second verse.

“I am the lover fair

Hath chose thee to mine heir,

And my name is Merry England.”

Charles laughed in delight as Jane sang in response.

“Here is my hand,

My dear lover England,

I am thine with both mind and heart.”

THE MORNING WAS BLESSEDLY UNEVENTFUL COMPARED TO THE PREVIOUS day’s ride, and at midday they stopped beneath a huge oak tree to eat. Jane was very conscious of Charles’s hands on her waist as he helped her to dismount, and she could feel her cheeks going pink at the vivid memory of his lips on hers the previous night.

“I had a close call of it last night,” Charles said when they were settled comfortably with their meal spread on a blanket, and Jane’s heart skipped before he broke into a smile.

“The cook told me to wind up the jack,” he said, taking a swallow of ale from the leather bottle. “And I had not an idea what she meant.”

“Oh, no,” Jane laughed. “It’s a spit for roasting meat, that winds up like a clock.”

“So I know now, but she must have thought me a thorough idiot when I looked around the room to see what she could mean. She pointed to it, and I took hold of the handle, but wound it the wrong way. Or so she told me, with a glower and a curse. ‘What simpleton are you,’ she asked, ‘that cannot work a jack?’ I thought quick and told her that I was but a poor tenant farmer’s son, and that we rarely had meat, and when we did, we didn’t use a jack to roast it.”

Henry laughed, but it was to Jane that Charles was looking with a smile on his face.

AS AFTERNOON DREW TOWARDS EVENING, A TALL CHURCH SPIRE rose in the distance ahead.

“That will be Cirencester,” Henry said. “The Crown Inn is said to be friendly and comfortable, though right at the marketplace and heavily travelled.”

“Then the Crown it is,” Charles said. “I’ll keep to the room and keep my head down when I must pass among strangers.”

The Crown lay just off the main road and only feet from the medieval stone church. As they rode into the inn yard, Jane was alarmed to see that it was full of soldiers and that another party of troopers were right behind them.

“Never fear,” Charles murmured, dismounting. “Leave it to me.”

He helped her to the ground, and after an exchange of glances, Henry tossed him the reins of his horse as well. To Jane’s astonishment, Charles swaggered forward into the crowd of red-coated soldiers, bumping into shoulders, stepping on feet, and provoking a hail of oaths as the men scrambled to avoid being trampled by the horses.

“Have a care, you clotpole!”

“Poxed idiot!”

Jane made to step forward, but Henry’s hand on her arm stayed her. Charles glanced around as if in astonishment, his mouth gaping open.

“Beg pardon, your worships.”

His accent was thickest Staffordshire, as if he had grown up in the country around Bentley Hall. A burly sergeant, tall but not so tall as Charles, shoved him hard and glowered at him.

“You whoreson fool! Do you need teaching manners?”

He pulled back his fist, and Charles flinched as though in fear.

“Kick him like the dog he is, Johnno,” another soldier called, and there was a chorus of laughs.

Charles plucked his hat from his head and hung his shoulders in sheepish apology.

“I’m sorry, your worship. Most sorry, sir.”

Johnno stood sneering at him, as if deciding whether to strike him or not, but then shrugged.

“Well, get on with you, then. And let it be a lesson to you for next time.”

“Oh, yes, sir,” Charles said, tugging at his forelock and grinning like a child reprieved from a whipping. “Thank you, sir.”

Nodding at the muttering soldiers to either side of him, he ambled towards the stable with the horses.

“I still say you should have thrashed him,” a second sergeant called out to Johnno.

“Not worth dirtying my coat.”

The men laughed, and turned their attention back to whatever they had been doing when they were interrupted.

“WITH ALL THESE SOLDIERS I’VE ONLY BUT TWO ROOMS LEFT,” THE landlord said. “And not even room for your servant in the stable. He’ll have to sleep on a pallet in your room, sir.” He had witnessed the scene in the stable yard, and grinned at Henry. “Perhaps it’s just as well you keep the fool out of harm’s way.”

They ordered food to be brought upstairs rather than going down to the taproom to eat, and by the time Jane had washed her face and hands, the men were already waiting in Henry’s room. Charles, in breeches and shirtsleeves, was lounging on a chair near the fire, his long legs stretched before him and his feet propped on a stool. He looked like a great cat, Jane thought, watching the play of his muscles beneath the linen of his shirt. There was something catlike about the glint in his eyes, too, as he gave her a lazy smile.

“Well,” he grinned. “I reckoned that blundering among the troops would anger them so that they’d not think to look beyond their rage, and so it did. But the ostler had keener eyes. As soon as I came into the stable, I took the bridles off the horses, and called him to me to help me give the horses some oats. And as he was helping me to feed the horses, ‘Sure, sir,’ says he, ‘I know your face.’”

Jane gasped and Henry looked at him in alarm, and Charles nodded wryly.

“Which was no very pleasant question to me, but I thought the best way was to ask him where he had lived. He told me that he was but newly come here, that he was born in Exeter and had been ostler in an inn there, hard by one Mr Potter’s, a merchant, in whose house I had lain at the time of war.”

“What ill luck!” Henry exclaimed.

“I thought it best to give the fellow no further occasion of thinking where he had seen me, for fear he should guess right at last. Therefore I told him, ‘Friend, certainly you have seen me there at Mr Potter’s, for I served him a good while, above a year.’ ‘Oh,’ says he, ‘Then I remember you a boy there.’”

Jane laughed at Charles’s impersonation of the ostler, nodding in sage satisfaction.

“And with that,” Charles continued, “he was put off from thinking any more on it but desired that we might drink a pot of beer together. Which I excused by saying that I must go wait upon my master and get his dinner ready for him, but told him that we were going for London and would return about three weeks hence, and then I would not fail to drink a pot with him.”

“Quick thinking, Your Majesty,” Henry grinned.

A knock at the door heralded the arrival of dinner. Once the kitchen boy was gone, Jane made to serve Charles, but he waved off her attentions and begged her and Henry to sit and eat with him.

Riding pillion for so many miles was wearying, and Jane’s body ached in unaccustomed places. The men appeared exhausted as well, and hot food and warmed wine brightened their spirits and revived their energy.

“Do you know”—Charles smiled over a leg of chicken—“I begin to think that I may be safe after all. Only one more day of riding, and we shall be at Bristol.”

“And nothing will hinder us from getting you there, Sire,” Henry said, “though it costs my life.”

Charles looked from Jane to Henry. “I can only hope that I will see the day when I can honour you as I wish for the help you have given me. I have been much humbled by the love and care shown to me by so many of my people these last days. Most of them have been poor folk with little enough for themselves, but they’ve risked their lives to keep me safe, and offered all they have. Indeed, one of them gave me the shirt off his back, quite truly.”

He plucked at his shirt, now grimy from the ride but clearly new.

“The people love you, Your Majesty,” Jane said. “And pray for your return.”

But none of them love you so well as I do, she thought, watching the flickering firelight play on his face.

Charles looked around the room, cosy with the fire crackling, its light chasing the shadows away, and smiled.

“A bed to sleep in tonight! I will ne’er take such comfort for granted again.”

“Of course you shall have the great bed, Your Majesty,” Henry said, “and I will take the pallet.”

“Even a pallet would be welcome,” Charles laughed, “and a great improvement from doubling myself up in priest holes, and a day spent sleeping in a tree.”

“In a tree?” Jane asked in astonishment.

“Yes,” Charles said. “When I was at Boscobel, the Giffards feared I would be discovered if I stayed within, even in the priest hole, so I spent a long day in an oak some little way behind the house, my head resting upon the lap of one Colonel Carlis, who I think you know?”

“Yes, an old friend,” Jane said.

“Cromwell’s men were searching in the woods nearby, and it scarcely seemed possible that we should escape detection. And yet despite all that, I was so tired, having gone three nights without sleep, that I slumbered, my head resting on the good colonel’s lap.”

“Will you tell us of the fight at Worcester, Your Majesty?” Henry asked, pouring more wine for all of them. “We’ve only heard pieces of the story, and none from any who know what happened so well as you.”

Charles’s eyes darkened, and Jane thought of the stories of confusion, despair, and horror she had heard from the soldiers fleeing from the battle.

“It was a desperate venture, in which people were laughing at the ridiculousness of our condition well before the battle. We had been three weeks marching from Scotland, with the rebels pursuing us, when we limped into Worcester. We knew Oliver was on his way with thirty thousand men, and I had but half that number, hungry, sick at heart, already worn out, many lacking even shoes to their feet.”

Jane thought of the ragged survivors on the road past Bentley the day after the battle. It was a wonder any had survived at all, she thought, if they had begun in such desperate condition.

“We needed every advantage we could get. We blew up the bridges leading to the town, dug earthworks, built up the fort, and waited. When at length Cromwell came, he fired upon the city, but made no further move for three days.”

Charles was on his feet now, pacing. Jane could imagine only too well the tension of the young king and his soldiers, knowing the battle would come but not when, having to stay vigilant and ready despite their exhaustion and apprehension.

“He was waiting, you see, for the third of September.” Charles turned to them, a bitter smile creasing his face. “A year to the day since he beat us at Dunbar. And when that day dawned, he moved.”

“John Lane and I were on our way to Worcester on that day, even as the fight was under way,” Henry said. “I would we had reached you in time to be of use.”

“I would you had, too. Had we had but a few thousand more so stouthearted, perhaps the fight would have ended differently.”

He leaned a hand on the mantelpiece and stood staring down into the fire. Jane tried to imagine how a battle started.

“How did it begin? How did you know what to do, how to place your men?” she asked.

“I began the day atop the cathedral with my officers,” Charles said. “Where we could see for miles in every direction. My heart was in my throat, I can tell you, to see the enemy off to the south, so numerous.”

Jane’s throat tightened to think what he must have felt, seeing the possibility of death and destruction marching inexorably towards him.

“I cannot say whether our hopes or fears were greatest that morning, but we had one stout argument—despair. For we knew that everything rested on the outcome of that day, and for me it would be a crown or a coffin. I took a last look at that great sweeping view, the wind on the river, my men massed and waiting, and went down to fight.”

Jane pictured him, mounted and armed, raising his sword aloft, rallying his men to battle.

Follow your spirit; and upon this charge

Cry “God for Harry, England, and Saint George!”

“If bravery and determination alone were enough, you would have won,” she said.

“You held the fort and the city walls for most of the day, did you not, Your Majesty?” Henry asked.

“So we did. The tide turned, alas, when they overran the fort, and turned our guns against us. The Duke of Hamilton, who led the Scots so valiantly, was grievous wounded by a cannonball.”

Jane winced. A cannonball could easily take off a man’s head or cut him in two.

“His men held off the charge at Sidbury Gate as long as they could, but once the enemy was within the city walls, the day was lost.”

“My lord Wilmot says he never saw a fiercer fight,” Henry said.

“My men made a last stand near the town hall, and I hope I may never see such a sight again as the red of the setting sun on the blood in the streets. But it just gave me time to get to my headquarters, cast off my armour, and bid Wilmot to meet me outside the gate with fresh horses if it could be done. As it was, I heard them breaking down the front door even as I slipped out the back, and though it was only steps to St Martin’s Gate, it was a near thing that I got out.”

His look of bleak despair chilled Jane’s heart, and she wished she could take him into her arms and comfort him.

“There was no other way, surely,” she said, “but for you to fly?”

“No,” Charles agreed. “My life and any hope for the future of the kingdom would have been lost had I tarried but five minutes longer. Outside the walls, Wilmot and I encountered some of our troops. I tried to rally them to go back and try once more, but it was no use, and it would probably have done little but let me die fighting instead of fleeing.”

The fire was burning low, and Jane was exhausted with the day’s riding. She longed for a minute alone with Charles, but there seemed no graceful way to manage it, so she rose to leave. Charles’s eyes met hers, and she felt their heat.

“Let me light you to your room, Mistress Jane,” he said, picking up the candle from the table.

“I’ll do it, Your Majesty,” Henry said, rising.

“Sit, Lascelles,” Charles said, and it was not a request. “I said I’ll light the lady’s way.”

Henry bowed his head in assent, though Jane could practically hear the questions and protests in his mind.

“Good night, Henry,” she said demurely, not meeting his eyes. “I’ll see you on the morrow.”

Candle in hand, Charles led the way down the passage. He loomed before her in the darkness, the candlelight silhouetting him in its golden glow. In a moment they would be alone. Her heart beat faster at the thought of his arms around her, his mouth on hers. But to Jane’s disappointment, when they got to her room he opened the door for her but did not follow her inside. She looked up at him, not quite daring to reach out a hand to touch him, to tilt her head back and draw him into a kiss. He took her hand, turned it over, and the feel of his lips on her palm made her belly contract with desire.

“I’ll go back to your cousin now, sweet Jane.”

No, Jane thought, don’t go.

Charles smiled and stroked her cheek, as if reading her thoughts. “Henry has hazarded his life for my safety, and I would not cause him unease or make him think I regard you with less than honourable respect, which indeed I do not.”

“Then good night, sir,” Jane said, turning.

“But, Jane,” Charles said, stopping the door with his foot, “I’ll see you in my dreams, make no mistake.”

CHAPTER FIVE

THE WAY TO ABBOTS LEIGH LAY THROUGH BRISTOL. THIS WAS THE most dangerous part of the journey yet, as Charles had spent some months there during the war and might be recognised, though he had aged from the sixteen-year-old boy who had left to the man he was today. Still, it was risky. Henry rode ahead, and Jane could see his shoulders tighten with tension as the increased traffic on the road told them they must be close to the city. His hand strayed to feel for the pistol at his belt, and he eyed passing strangers warily, as though a bent old woman with a flock of geese might be hiding a Parliamentary trooper beneath her skirts.

At length the towering city walls with their arched gates rose ahead.

“Lawford’s Gate,” Charles said over his shoulder to Jane. “The last time I was here the mayor met me with a crowd of dignitaries to welcome me.”

“Better we find our own way today,” Jane said.

Charles pulled his hat lower over his brow as they followed Henry through the massive portal and into the open marketplace, with a castle beyond. The streets were bustling with people on foot and on horseback, with wagons and carts, and with sheep and cattle. Wolverhampton was the biggest town Jane had ever been in, and this was far bigger, she realised with excitement.

“Is London like this?” she asked in Charles’s ear.

“London?” he laughed. “No, this is nothing to London. It’s a good city, though; I liked it here and was sorry to leave. Do you know, I have a month’s mind to see what progress was made on the fortifications since then.” He spurred the horse forward to ride up next to Henry.

“We’ve plenty of daylight left to reach Abbots Leigh,” he said in a low voice. “Let’s ride to St Michael’s Hill to see what became of our works after Oliver took the city.”

Henry glanced around them. People everywhere, including many soldiers. Jane could see him forming his words carefully.

“Is it wise? The sooner you are safely out of the city the better.”

“But half an hour,” Charles said cheerfully. “Humour me. Come, I cannot tell when I may chance to be in Bristol again.”

Before Henry could answer, Charles rode ahead and set off on a street branching away from the marketplace. He seemed infused with a new vigour and excitement, his head held higher, his back straighter. Despite his plain clothes, he looked like a king, Jane thought with both pride and alarm as she wrapped her arms tighter around him.

“The Royal Fort.” Charles pointed as the walls to the northwest of the city came into view. “We rebuilt that when we took the city in ’44, and did much else to strengthen the line of the defences.”

Henry rode beside them, his professional interest as a soldier overcoming his caution, and Charles carried on his commentary in a low voice. It was a beautiful day, a fresh breeze blowing off the water, feathery clouds scudding above, the river full of shipping, the quays swarming with sailors and with dockworkers loading and unloading the ships that rode at anchor.

“My lodgings were just there,” Charles said, pointing out a tall house that rose on a hillside. “And look, there’s the fish peddler my cook used to buy from.”

“Then perhaps we had better ride further from him,” Jane murmured.

“You’re right. And probably time that we made for Abbots Leigh anyway.”

“High time,” Jane heard Henry mutter.

Charles wheeled his horse away from the fort. The hilly streets wound up and down, and just as it seemed to Jane as if they must be heading back the way they had come, Charles reined in and came to a halt. Henry rode up next to him with an inquiring glance.

“Hmm,” Charles said. “I was sure this was the right road.” He glanced behind them and then ahead. “But it doesn’t look at all familiar now. Of course the city has changed …”

Passersby were noting them and Jane felt very conspicuous. She glanced anxiously at Henry and saw that his jaw was tight and his face reddening.

“Let me see now,” Charles muttered. “There’s the sun, so that’s west. We want to go west and north, more or less, once we cross the river, but surely we must go further south first. No, I must have missed a turning.”

He rode confidently back the way they had come and turned into another street about halfway down the hill, and then into another. But they seemed no nearer the river, and Jane could feel Henry’s increasing agitation. A few minutes longer and she was truly worried. The map had shown the general route to Abbots Leigh, but she had no idea how long it would take them to reach it, and the sun was dropping low over the horizon.

“Perhaps we should ask someone,” she ventured, but she wasn’t sure it was the wisest course. As urgent as it was to find their way, any interaction with strangers could bring calamity upon them. Suppose they had the ill luck to speak to someone who recognised the king’s face? The thousand-pound reward was a mighty inducement to betray him, and if they were lost they would have no hope of escaping if they were pursued. She glanced around to see what passersby looked least threatening, and was alarmed to see a small party of soldiers emerging from a tavern a little way ahead, their voices ringing out with boisterous laughter.

“No, I’m sure this must be right now,” Charles said, spurring the horse into a trot down the hill. The road did bring them to an area more heavily peopled, and Jane thought they must be near the quays now, but once more Charles stopped. An inn stood at one side of the road, and a sturdily built ostler was just unhitching a horse from a cart.

“Good even, brother,” Charles called out, and the man glanced up. No light of recognition showed in his eyes, Jane was relieved to see, as they rode closer.

“Like a fool, I’ve lost my way,” Charles said, his words thick with the accent of Staffordshire. “Would you be good enough to tell me how to find the Redcliffe Gate afore my mistress boxes my ears?”

It didn’t take much acting for Jane to look thoroughly annoyed, and the ostler’s red face creased in a grin.

“Not much used to cities, art thou, then, hayseed?”

“No, truly,” Charles laughed with an embarrassed shrug. “I’ve ne’er seen so many houses and people in my life.”

“Well, look you,” the fellow said, and Jane, Henry, and Charles paid close heed to the directions he gave.

“Thankee, friend,” Charles called with a farewell wave. “And I hope to do you a good turn someday.”

“Not likely, boobee!” the stranger laughed. “But I thank you for the thought.”

Jane was relieved when once again the city walls came within view and a high stone gate loomed before them.

“That’s it,” Charles said. “We’ll cross the river at Rownham Passage. It’s not far now, and we can’t miss it.”

This time he was right. The road sloped down to the muddy banks of the Avon, and a ferry was crossing back from the opposite side. The ferryman nodded at them as they rode aboard and Henry counted out their fares, but he didn’t give Charles a second glance. Jane looked in awe at the magnificent deep gorge between two rocky cliffs, through which the river passed on its long journey from Stratford towards the sea.

“It’s only two or three miles now.” Henry sounded relieved as they reached the far bank of the river. “We could take the main road, but according to the map there’s an old Roman road that goes up through the orchard.”

“Then let us use that,” Charles said. “For in this instance, the only way to go is up, and the more private we can be, the better.”

The main road lay before them, climbing a steep hill, the late-afternoon sun slanting down through the canopy of tall trees that lined the road, but Henry led them off to the right, and they easily found the track that wound up through the apple trees, heavy with their red and gold fruit. Jane inhaled the scent, thinking of the orchard at Bentley.

“Boobee?” Charles mused, turning his head over his shoulder to speak to her. “What did the fellow mean by calling me that?”

“It’s a song,” Jane laughed. “All about a country clodhopper that goes to London.”

“Ah.” Charles grinned. “Then I can congratulate myself that I’ve pulled the wool over the eyes of at least one proud man of Bristol. Still, I don’t relish another evening in the kitchens as I spent at Long Marston. It might be more prudent to contrive some way to keep me apart from the household at Abbots Leigh.”

“True,” Jane said. “We could say that you’re ill and not fit to mix with the other servants.”

“That would serve,” Charles agreed. “And I’ve no doubt I look pale and haggard, what with the miles of riding and walking, and the lack of meat and sleep over the past week.”

They were near the summit of the hill now, and Jane was pleased to think that they were so close to having accomplished what they set out to do—get the king in safety to where he could wait while Lord Wilmot found him safe passage from England—but she felt a pang at the realisation that their arrival meant her time with Charles was growing short. How long would it take Lord Wilmot to arrive and then to find a boat? Would she have another evening with Charles? Two? What heartache it would be to turn for home and ride back to Bentley behind Henry. She tightened her arms around Charles’s waist, and he patted her hand.

“Tired?” he asked. “We must be nearly there now.”

“I am weary of riding, but not of your company.”

His hand brushed hers, and his lips tickled her ear as he spoke, his voice a husky whisper. “I shall not let you part from me just yet, sweetheart.”

The horses seemed to sense that they were near the end of their journey, and they pressed on despite the steepness of the hill. Soon a high stone gateway with a two-storeyed gatehouse rose ahead.

“That must be it,” Henry said, turning. He slowed so that Charles and Jane pulled even with him. “It’s a big household and there will be grooms enough to deal with horses,” he said, his voice low. “It would be safer for you to wait near the stables while Jane makes arrangements with her cousin to lodge you somewhere quiet.”

As they passed through the arched gateway, the road curved, and the great house stood before them, perched on the summit of the hill. Jane let out a little cry.

“What a grand house!”

It was a fine house, its imposing front three storeys high, with a row of a dozen gables along the roof, its vast lawns rolling away downhill in all directions. On the green before the house, eight or ten people were playing at bowls, and two or three more lounged on the wide front steps to watch the game’s progress. Jane was just as glad that she did not see Ellen among those gathered; she could ride to the back of the house with Charles and Henry and make a more quiet entrance than if she had had to stop to greet Ellen before all those people.

Henry had been right, and as soon as the horses approached the stables, two boys came running out to take the horses by their bridles while the riders dismounted.

“Wait here, Jackson,” Jane said, “while I find Mrs Norton.”

She didn’t have far to look, however, for a voice from above called out happily.

“Jane! You’re here!” Ellen leaned out a window, beaming. Jane laughed with pleasure to see the familiar tousled blonde curls and rosy cheeks.

“Ellen! How radiant you look!”

“Stay just where you are,” Ellen called. “I’ll be down directly!”

She appeared a moment later at the back door, and Jane rushed to embrace her, careful of her bulging belly.

“Come in, come in,” Ellen urged. “You must be worn out with the ride, and I’m so big I can scarce get about.”

“Ellen, you remember my cousin Henry Lascelles?” Jane asked. Henry and Ellen bowed to each other as Charles hovered in the background. “And I wonder if I might beg a favour. My man Jackson here has been ill of an ague. I would take it most kind if you would let him have a good chamber with a fire so that he might go early to bed, or I fear the boy will never recover.”

“Of course, of course, the poor lad,” Ellen agreed, giving a vague smile in Charles’s direction. “I’ll have Pope see to him directly. But come with me, dear Jane, I want all the news from home.”

Jane had just time to settle herself in her room, visit briefly with Ellen, and wash her hands and face and change her clothes before it was time for supper. She insisted on carrying a dish of broth to her ailing man herself, and the butler Pope showed her the way to the garret room where Charles was lodged.

“Mrs Norton has asked Dr Gorge to look at your man after supper, madam,” Pope said as they climbed the stairs.

“Oh,” Jane faltered, “that’s most kind.”

She tried without success to think how she could plausibly refuse the offer and decided she would just have to warn Charles. Fortunately, Pope left her at the door of Charles’s room, and she slipped in to find him stretched on a bed before a blazing fire. He sat up as she came in, grinning at the sight of the steaming bowl.

“Your friend is very kind to accommodate me so well,” Charles said. “Please give her the humble thanks of William Jackson, and let us hope that I can make more suitable thanks later.”

He tilted the bowl and drank hungrily, reminding Jane of a ravenous dog.

“Ah, that’s good.” He sighed in satisfaction.

“Don’t worry,” Jane smiled. “I’ll tell the butler you’re up to proper food, and I’m sure he’ll see to it that you’re well fed. But there’s a doctor visiting the house, and Ellen has asked him to look at you.”

Charles shrugged. “It’s not much of a part I have to play, being wan and weary.”

“Good,” Jane said. She knew she must hasten to the dinner table, but she was loath to leave him. “Shall I look in on you later, to make sure all is well?”

She said it carelessly, but wondered if Charles could hear her heart thumping in her chest.

“I would take it most kind,” he said, taking her hand, and she cursed herself because she knew she was blushing as she took the empty dish from him and went out the door.

THE HOUSEHOLD AT ABBOTS LEIGH WAS LARGE, CONSISTING NOT only of Ellen and George and George’s mother, but of sundry siblings and cousins and friends, including the clergyman and physician Dr Gorge, who had been watching the bowls when they arrived, and seemingly dozens of servants.

Over supper the discussion turned inevitably to the battle at Worcester and speculation about the fate of the king. Jane was glad Charles had suggested being kept secluded, and as soon as she could excuse herself after supper, she slipped up to his room. She was alarmed to find him with a bloody handkerchief pressed to his nose.

“What’s amiss, sir?” she cried.

“It’s nothing.” Charles waved off her concern, pulling the handkerchief from his nose to see whether the flow had stopped. “I get nosebleeds from time to time, with no rhyme or reason to them, but I suffer no ill effects beyond the inconvenience.” He patted the bed. “Come, sit with me.”

She sat beside him, very conscious of their being alone. He turned to her and took her hand, and she felt suddenly shy.

“Did the doctor come?” she asked, a trifle too brightly.

“Indeed he did. And as soon as I caught sight of his face, I knew him.”

Jane caught her breath in alarm.

“He was chaplain to my father when I was a boy. I kept to my bed, and as much as I could, turned my face from the candle so that I should be in shadow, and I don’t think he knew me.” He gave a wry smile. “Perhaps it was foolish to say I was ill. It’s made me an object of many kind attentions. The butler himself brought my dinner, and a maid came, too, with a warm posset to speed my recovery. Maybe it’s only my fancy, but I felt that they looked on me strangely.”

Jane’s stomach tensed in panic. “Oh, dear, what shall we do?”

“Nothing for now. Wilmot should be here tomorrow, and with any luck he’ll have news of a ship for me.”

Jane remembered with a catch in her heart that this might be the last time she would have Charles’s company alone. He seemed to read her mind.

“Oh, Jane,” he said, brushing a curl from her cheek and letting his hand trail down her jaw. “Would that I might keep you with me a little longer. I have been so much alone.”

She looked up into his face, seeing both the warrior king and lost little boy, and felt overwhelmed by desire and tenderness.

“When the war started,” he said, “my family scattered. I was twelve. I went with my father, and I tried to be a man. I cried most pitifully when I was parted from him three years later. It was in Oxford. It was raining, and I hoped that the raindrops would conceal the tears on my face. No ocean could have hidden my tears if I had known that I would never see him again.”

Jane saw that tears glistened in his eyes. He took her hand, and kept it resting on his thigh.

“His death was a cruel shock to England,” she said. “I cannot think what an unbearable grief it must have been to you.”

“I was told that on the scaffold he said just one word,” Charles said. “‘Remember.’”

A shiver ran through Jane.

“Like Hamlet’s father.”

“Yes. And here I am, like Hamlet, charged to avenge my father’s murder and the loss of his crown.”

“But you are not like Hamlet. You do not hesitate.”

“No, I need no Mousetrap to know where the guilt lies. And when the way seems hard, as now, I think to myself, ‘Remember thee? Ay, thou poor ghost, while memory holds a seat in this distracted globe.’”

He bent his head to Jane and kissed her, taking her head in his hands and pulling her close to him, and she responded hungrily, sinking back onto the bed as he moved towards her. He showered her with kisses, her eyes, her ears, her throat, then back to her mouth, and she burned for him with an intensity of feeling she had not known was possible. This was what she had been longing for—passion and love, lifting her above the dreariness of daily life.

Charles pulled away from her, hand stroking her throat, his breathing rapid.

“Go from me, Jane. I should never have touched you so.”

His eyes were searing into her, his touch hot on her skin, and she had never felt so alive. This was what she had feared she would never know, this rush of rapture and fever of excitement throughout her body. She had torn herself away from him the night before, but to do so again, knowing that they would likely part on the morrow, called for more strength than she possessed.

“I will not go from you, Your Majesty,” she murmured, her hand trembling as she laid it on his chest. She felt his heart thudding and saw his throat move as he swallowed.

“Jane,” he whispered, nuzzling her ear. “If you stay, I cannot answer for the consequences. I’ve not been with a woman in a year and a half. My blood quite overcrows my scruples, and if I am much longer in your presence, I will lose mastery of myself entirely.”

Jane took his hand and kissed it.

“It is well lost in such a cause. I give myself to you.”

“Jane.”

His voice was husky. He pulled her to him, kissing her deeply as they sank together onto the bed. His hands were lifting her petticoats, and he was on top of her, parting her legs with his knees.

It was wrong, Jane knew, but she didn’t care. She would have let him take her though the mouth of hell gaped before her. His fingers were caressing, exploring, making his way easy. She gasped to feel the hard flesh pressing against her, entering her, driving deep within her. She pulled him into her, rising to meet his thrusts until a wave built and crashed within her, and he put a hand over her mouth to stifle her moans. A moment later he arched his head back and his whole body gave a convulsive shudder. Then he was still, and rolled to the side to hold her close, and they lay panting in each other’s arms.

“Oh, Jane, forgive me,” he whispered at last. “I should have stopped myself, no matter what you said.”

“I didn’t want you to stop,” she said into his ear, her hand stroking his sweat-soaked back. “I don’t want to lose you. After tomorrow I will see you no more, but I can always remember tonight.”

“Stay with me,” Charles said. “Don’t leave until morning, if this night is all we have.”

AS THE LIGHT OF DAYBREAK CREPT THROUGH THE WINDOW, CHARLES and Jane made love again, this time more slowly, unencumbered by clothes or hesitation. Jane looked up at Charles, memorising each detail of his face, the dark stubble of his beard on his flushed cheeks, the heavy lashes of his eyes, the fall of dark hair. She found her hands grasping him to her and marvelled at the hardness of his muscles, their tightening as he moved within her.

When they had both spent, she lay nestled in his arms, not wanting to move. But Henry or Pope the butler or someone else could come to the door at any moment.

“I must go,” she said, kissing his chest and inhaling his scent. “Before I am discovered.”

“And I will brave the kitchen,” he said, reaching for his breeches. “Perhaps I may hide better by going among the household than by staying mewed up here. But I beg you, come back in an hour or two, and tell me what news you hear.”

She pulled on her clothes hastily, and he bent to give her a last kiss before she tore herself from him and crept out the door.

JANE AND ELLEN WALKED OUT AFTER BREAKFAST, ELLEN HAPPILY showing Jane the gardens and the sweeping views downhill in all directions.

“Breathtaking,” Jane said, gazing at the shadowed fields and forests far in the distance.

“Yes,” Ellen agreed. “I do love it here, as much as I miss you and my family.” She put her arm through Jane’s. “Oh, Jane, I hope you will stay for a long visit.”

“I’d like to.” Jane smiled. “I’ve missed you more than I can tell you, and have longed for your advice.”

It was true, she reflected, though now everything seemed to have changed. A few weeks ago she had wondered if she would know love if it came to her. Now she knew without a doubt that she was in love, but she could certainly not confess it to Ellen or anyone else.

“Good.” Ellen squeezed her hand. “There will be plenty of time for confidences.”

A LITTLE LATER, CHARLES ANSWERED JANE’S SOFT KNOCK AT THE door of his little room and drew her in swiftly, holding her to him and kissing her.

“Oh, Jane, I feel so alive in your arms.”

Her head swam at the intensity of his presence, the taste and smell and feel of him.

“And I in yours.” She thought she had never felt so vibrantly aware of her body or been swept by such emotion as she felt now looking up at him.

“Come,” he said, drawing her down to sit beside him on the bed. “I must consult with you. I feel like a hare being chased by hounds, and I don’t know whether to hide in the thickets or run for it.”

“What’s happened?”

“I went down to the kitchen after you left, having a very good stomach after such a night.” He cocked an eyebrow at her and she blushed and smiled.

“The doctor saw me, and asked what news I had of Worcester. It took me by surprise and I scarce knew how to answer, and seeing my hesitation, he said, ‘I am afraid you are a Roundhead, but I will try what mettle you are made of.’ Then what should he do but takes me into the buttery and drinks me the king’s health in a glass of wine! So what could I do but drink as well, wishing myself good health, did he but know it.”

“Then he didn’t know you last night!” Jane felt a surge of relief.

“It would seem not, but things only got hotter from there. I went to the buttery hatch to get my breakfast and the butler Pope was there with two or three other fellows. We fell to eating bread and butter, along with some very good ale and sack he gave us. One, that looked like a country fellow, sat just by me, and began to talk of the fight at Worcester, giving so particular an account to the company that I concluded he must be one of Cromwell’s soldiers.”

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