Ginny dropped an egg on the brick floor of the henhouse. It
splattered in golden and white reproof, and the hens cackled in mockery. She
garnered the remaining eggs in the skirt of her apron and made her way back to
the house. She had an immensely difficult task to complete, and she would
complete it, consigning the aberrant response to the man, her captor, Alex Marshall,
colonel in the New Model Army, to the cess pit where it belonged.
Ginny took pleasure from the vulgarity of her thought as she
entered the empty pantry. She took a loaf of bread, apples from the dry store,
a round of cheese, and
a
slab of bacon, placing
them
carefully in a deep wicker basket that she then
covered with a piece of sacking. The basket was heavy, but she would have to
swing it as nonchalantly as if it were empty. When she returned, the basket
would innocently contain produce from the vegetable garden and orchard. But her
heart beat uncomfortably fast when she reentered the kitchen where a soldier in
a leathern apron was mixing cornmush in a huge cauldron simmering over the vast
range.
"Ah, Mistress Courtney." The colonel appeared in
the kitchen door. Ginny
'
s hand tightened on the handle of the
basket. Supposing he should offer to carry it for her? The sweat of fear
trickled down her back.
"
You
were looking for me, Colonel? As you see, I am still here, in obedience to your
command."
To her relief, the sardonic note rang true and clear, and she
saw the humor leave his face to be replaced wi
th
an angry glower. There were at least half a dozen soldiers in the
kitchen to overhear the insolent challenge in her tone, and the colonel could not,
on this occasion, allow it to pass.
"
You
would be well advised to remain so." He clipped his words and
then
strode out of the kitchen into the main part of the
house.
"
Eh,
mistress, if you'll accept a word of advice, you'd best watch your step with
the colonel. He's a fair man, but a hard one if he's crossed." The advice
came from the soldier in the leathern apron, his face as brown and wrinkled as
a pickled walnut.
Ginny shrugged with an assumption of insouciance.
"
Should he come inquiring for me, you may
tell him that I am gone to pick vegetables and fruit for his dinner. He should
not take objection to such an innocent activity." She went back into the
yard and made her way toward the vegetable plot where she remained for a few
minutes, desultorily picking beans.
There was no one in sight; the barn hid the vegetable plot
from the stableyard and from the ground-floor windows at the back of the house.
She would have to take the risk that no one was watching from an upstairs
window to see her saunter casually from the garden in the direction of the west
side of the house. Except for Ginny
'
s
corner casement, the wall here was windowless, facing as it did the Atlantic Ocean from where the winter gales roared viciously, battering against the
wind-pitted stone. There was no garden on this extremity either, just the
springy turf o
f
the headland stretching to the cliff
top. Once there, one would need to know exactly where the door was to identify,
in the seemingly haphazard cracks of the stonework, the
th
ree lines that formed the rectangle. The spring lock
was cunningly concealed beneath the moss clinging to the base of the wall. One
minute a small figure in a blue ki
rt
le
stood against the wall of
the
house, and the next it had disappeared
with all the speed and dexterity of an illusionist.
The air was cold and musty, the stone steps narrow and steep,
and it was as black as pitch. But Ginny knew the way too well to need light,
although she never made the journey without fear, however hard she tried to
rationalize. There were no skeletons, no hobgoblins, no monstrous spiders and
gigantic rats waiting to leap out at her; and she was no longer the petrified
nine year old that Edmund had lured into the secret passage and then abandoned.
By the time he had come back for her, she had been hysterical and inconsolable,
and it was only loyalty to her beloved playmate that kept her silent in the
face of adult questioning. She had had her reward for the remainder of that
summer. Edmund had been her willing, grateful slave and never once told her she
was only a stupid girl and she couldn't go birds' nesting or rock climbing, or
any of the other infinitely exciting pursuits
that
seemed to fall most unfairly to the lot of the male gender.
Ginny smiled to herself as the memories chased away her fear,
and she felt her way up the steps. She had received a goodly number of
switchings that summer for neglecting her household duties, until John Redfern
had told his distraught wife to allow the child a few months of freedom. She
had a lifetime of duty ahead of her . . .
A glimmer of light appeared above, and Ginny paused to catch
her bream. The basket seemed much heavier now, and the climb was steep. The
faint glow, she knew, came from a single tallow candle, and the light reassured
her not only of the journey's end but of the well-being of the fugitives.
"Ginny?" It was barely a whisper.
"
Yes."
She climbed the last few steps and emerged into the small round chamber.
Edmund struggled up from his pallet, his face even more ashen
than she had expected.
"
Are
you worse?" Ginny took the three paces necessary to reach him, panic
flickering in her eyes.
"
No,
no," he reassured her.
"
Better.
But what is happening? Peter and I have been desperate for news. They have
come?"
"They have come," she affirmed it simply and turned
to the other man. Like the wounded Edmund he was unshaven, the long wavy hair
of the Cavalier unkempt.
It had been ten days since Edmund Verney and Peter Ashley had
taken refuge in the priest
'
s hole, following the example of a
dozen others in the preceding months. Last November, they had come with the
king to Carisbrooke Castle and for four months had played the role of king's
courtier, helping to maintain the myth that Charles I was no prisoner, simply a
king indulging his divine right to do as he pleased—
a
myth that Parliament had been prepared to indulge
until war had begun again on the mainland, and the likes of Alex Marshall had
been sent to the island to make manifest the king's imprisonment. There had
been skirmishes between the local Royalists and Parliament's reinforcements,
and Edmund, Ginny
'
s hotheaded cousin, Who had never
learned to recognize trouble unless it came with
t
he force of a sledgehammer, had put aside the rol
e
of
c
ourtier and
ventured forth to wage battle against those whom he still considered to be
rebels. He had sent at least
tw
o to their
deaths in a scrap at Newport before the sword point had slipped through his
shoulder.
There was no safety then in Carisbrooke for the wounded
murderer of Parliament
'
s men. Colonel Hammond could not
afford to antagonize Parliament by providing protection, and the king, himself,
was powerless. Edmund, with Peter's help, by night and by stealth, had made the
journey
fr
om Newport to Alum Bay—
n
ot a long journey if one was
n
ot bleeding from a deep wound, and if one was not
being hunted. They had evaded the hunters to find spurious safety with a
nineteen-year-old widow who, day by day, awaited
th
e arrival of the occupying forces—
a
n
arrival
that
would put an end to her
"
safe
"
house and the runs she made in the s
m
all sailboat, ferrying fugitives across the Solent to
a
pla
ce where
they
could prepare themselves to fight another day.
"Peter, I have brought enough food for several days;
there
i
s no knowing when I may be able to
return. There are a
b
out two-hundred men. The officers
have occupied house, and the men are setting up camp in the orchard Hardens
.
"
"But what of you?
''
Edmund demanded, wincing as sudden anxious movement sent pain shooting through
bandaged shoulder.
"I am under house arrest." Ginny dropped to her
knees beside the pallet and began to unwrap the blood-
s
tiffened bandages.
"
The
colonel appears to have some stran
g
ely
c
a
valier notions about the propriety of
sending a recalcitr
an
t widowed minor to seek her
fortune." She gave Edmund her usual mischievous grin as she made her tone
light a
n
d teasing.
"
I am become, I am reliably informed,
a ward of Parliament. Is it not absurd?"
Edmund managed a wan smile that did little to hide the pain
in his eyes as she eased the dressing from the ugly shoulder wound. Ginny
sniffed the torn, reddened skin carefully and then signed with relief.
"
It is still clean; there are no signs
of malignancy, thanks be, and it is healing well. I was unable to bring a fresh
poultice but will try to leave one beneath the elder bush outside in the
morning, and milk and eggs. You have sufficient water, Peter?"
"
At
the moment." The young man indicated the keg in the corner of the room.
"
Now Edmund's fever has abated he
needs less, and I can manage with little."
Ginny frowned. "Bringing water presents more
difficulties than food. I would not care to explain to Colonel
Ma
rshall why I choose to carry pails of water to the
cliff head."
"
Marshall
?" Peter stared at her.
"
Alex Marshall?"
"Why, yes. Do you know him?"
"We were at Oxford together. He is the youngest son of
the earl of Grantham. There was a time when we were close friends ..."
Peter's whisper faded. "He was a powerful friend and, I fancy, will be as
powerful an opponent."
Ginny frowned.
"
What
else do you know of him, Peter? Did he once play at court as scandalously as
the rest of you?" She smiled in the hope that the question would thus seem
joking and disinterested.
"
Not
Alex Marshall," Peter declared. "He has always been a career soldier
with leanings toward the Puritan. He and Prince Rupert were close, though—
both
mad for soldiering and both brilliant commanders—
u
ntil this damnable war happened, and Alex, for reasons
of his own, joined the rebels. It nearly killed his father, and his mother died
soon after, of a broken heart, it is said. The earl has disowned him, and his
brothers are sworn to vengeance."
Ginny shuddered as she filled in the details this succinct
word picture gave of a devastating family schism. What kind of man was it, who
could split his family asunder for the sake of a political ideal? Who could
forsake all the traditional loyalties to king and kin?
"He is not a man to be trifled with." Peter tuned
uncannily into her thoughts.
"
He is a
man of rigid principles and has always been held in both fear and respect by
friends and foes alike. His loyalty is to his country, first and foremost. He
was always in favor of reform, of a reduction in the king's power. When he came
out against the king, there was little surprise."
"We leave here tonight." Edmund spoke with more
strength than he had evinced in the last week. "You stand in sufficient
danger already, Ginny. If you are caught harboring wanted men, then you will
lose your head."
"Oh, stuff!" She tore a sheet of fresh linen and
began to rebandage the wound. "It is quite perfect. Who is to suspect two
fugitive Cavaliers of hiding in the midst of the lion's den? You could not be
safer and will suffer only boredom and inactivity until you are able to travel.
In the meantime, I will make myself an obedient prisoner of the colonel's, and
his cohorts will become accustomed to my presence and will cease to notice me.
The sailboat is well hidden in the cave, and when you are well enough to sail
for the mainland, we shall contrive our escape."
"
Edmund
is right," Peter said heavily.
"
You
must no longer bring us supplies, not when a brigade of Roundheads swarms over
the estate. We will make our escape this night."
"Now you are being absurd. Apart from the fact that
Edmund is weak and in pain, I do not know the routine of the camp yet. We must
wait for the moment when the tide is right and we are least likely to be
observed. Otherwise, we shall all lose our heads."