For a longer span of time than his mother
liked, Nicholas appeared to be considering the second threat. He
finally turned to his sister, and his tone told Lady Spencer that
all joking had been put aside.
“I have been very careful not to create any
misunderstandings with regard to Clara and my intentions toward
her. The girl is nearly half my age.”
“She is
not
half your age!” Fanny
corrected, sliding over to her brother’s side. “Clara Purefoy
turned eighteen this past winter. You are thirty-four. At no time
since you’ve known her you have been twice her age.”
“By ‘sblood, what does one
do
with a
child of eighteen?”
Lady Spencer arched a brow. “From the steady
stream of rumors reaching me in Brussels, I might have been led to
believe that you are quite proficient in managing women of all
ages.” Alexandra patted her frowning son on the knee. “Your
uneasiness, my dear, stems from the thought of marriage and
commitment. Clara’s age is only an excuse, and you shall quell your
fears quickly.”
“Truly, Nick…” Frances chirped from his
side. “She is everything that you could possibly want in a
wife.”
“And as an only child, Clara brings with her
a great fortune.”
“Not that you need it,” his sister cut
in.
“But considering your lifestyle, my dear, it
never hurts to have a little more.” Lady Spencer gazed out the
window, not wanting to pressure him too much at one time. “A matter
which I find highly endearing, though, is how smitten with you the
whole family appears to be.”
“But Mother, everyone knows how advantageous
it is when a daughter marries someone with a title. After all, even
a baronet with a reputation as bad as Nick’s is…”
“It isn’t that!” Alexandra waved off her
daughter impatiently. “It is your brother’s warm personality that
has charmed them. His education. His exemplary military service.
His respectability… ”
“Before the age of twenty.”
Lady Spencer directed a severe glare at her
daughter. “Frances Marie, you will mind your tongue.” The older
woman smoothed out the imaginary wrinkles on her skirts again and
turned her full attention to her son, who was once again enthralled
by the passing scenery. “Where was I?”
“You had just expressed your wish for me to
stop this carriage,” Nicholas suggested darkly. “So that you
both
can find your way back to London.”
***
The old bishop and his secretary watched in
terror as several of the white-shirted rebels whipped the flanks of
the horses and sent the driverless carriage down the road. The
bishop’s half-dozen attendants, who’d been forced from their places
when the carriage was stopped, ran off down the country road after
the horses.
“You cannot get away with this, you filthy
ruffians.” The bishop’s voice shook with anger and some fear. “Your
masks and your devilish linen shirts shan’t do you a bit of good
when they put ropes about your necks and send you off to the Lord’s
judgment. ‘Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord.’”
Five men on horseback looked on as twenty on
foot encircled the two clerics. The silence of the group was
unnerving. Before the bishop could speak again, his secretary—a
portly younger man with flushed cheeks—saw one small opening in the
ring of attackers. Seizing the opportunity, he dropped the satchel
he’d been clutching to his chest and ran. A thick leather binder
filled with papers and a very healthy looking purse of coins
spilled out onto the road. No one bothered to stop the terrified
secretary.
“I know every one of you behind those
masks,” the bishop bluffed. “I know your kin and I know the filthy
hovels you each live in.”
A number of the assailants moved forward
menacingly, forcing the old cleric back against a tree at the edge
of the road.
“You touch me, you dogs, and I’ll call down
God’s wrath on all of you. I am the servant of righteousness, and
you are the spawn of devils. You are…” He gasped as a rope looped
around his middle from behind, yanking him hard against the
tree.
“This is for forcing the payment of the
tithe on the tenants north of Kinsale who lost their crops to the
tempest last month.”
The bishop looked fearfully at the masked
man to his right who had spoken the words. Last spring, he’d heard
of a
papist
priest who had been left tied to a tree near
Kildare. The bugger had gone for two days without any food or water
before someone had found him and let him go. There had been another
incident involving a curate near Caher Castle not three weeks ago.
He didn’t care to think of that one. Of course, neither of the
clerics had been killed—only badly mistreated and frightened half
to death.
Two men grabbed the bishop’s hands and tied
a rope around his wrists.
“This is for refusing to baptize bairns in
Ulster simply because the kin couldn’t afford your higher
fees.”
“That was not I! I have no say what goes on
up…” The bishop’s protest trailed off weakly as his bravado turned
to fear. Another member of the group approached with a rope and
dropped it deftly over his head. “No! I beg you…!”
Instead of shirts of coarse white linen and
the faces made unrecognizable by the masks, the clergyman’s mind
conjured images from the meeting he’d had with the magistrate, Sir
Robert Musgrave, not three days earlier. He’d been promised that
all priests would be protected against such attacks by the
Whiteboys. As a concession, he’d offered to support the landowners
around Youghal who were forcing their farm tenants out to make way
for pasturing, and in the end, his own safety had been guaranteed.
Guaranteed! Where was that bloody magistrate
now
?
“Do you wish to say a final prayer, Your
Excellency? Do you wish to ask forgiveness of the Lord for staining
His good name? Perhaps for your shameful acts of greed?”
The clergyman’s eyes focused on the rope
dangling from his neck. The clerics abused before had been simple
parish priests. He was a
bishop
. He couldn’t help but wonder
if these people would actually kill him to send their message loud
and clear across the land.
The words that began spilling out were
indeed prayers. Prayers asking forgiveness for exactly the things
he was being accused of.
***
As the carriage suddenly slowed, Nicholas
put his head out and looked beyond the horses. He’d heard that
travelers occasionally encounter highwaymen on the roads—here as at
home—but this was the strangest looking outlaw he’d ever seen.
Beyond a fork just ahead, where one road
bent sharply to the right, a fat clergyman was puffing toward them,
his arms waving madly in the air, his piteous cries nearly
incoherent from his lack of breath.
Nicholas shouted to the driver and stepped
out as the carriage rolled to a stop.
“Whiteboys…bishop…killing…there…there!” The
man appeared nearly out of his mind with terror, grabbing onto him
for support. “Save me…help…bishop!”
Nicholas detached the man from his arm,
handing him over to his valet, who’d been riding behind on his
master’s horse. He motioned to Frances to remain in the carriage as
she opened the door to step out. He glanced in the direction that
the clergy had come. The wooded slope running up to the west was
dark and densely forested. There was nothing to be seen from
here.
“’Twould be safest, sir, for the ladies if
we was to keep moving,” the driver offered from his perch on the
carriage. “Locals call ‘em Shanavests. That’d be Irish for
Whiteboys. They’re a troublesome bunch…if ye be asking me.”
The cleric, who was slumped against the
carriage and trying to catch his breath, suddenly straightened.
“But…but you cannot simply…simply leave him…they’ll kill him.”
“May be,” the driver agreed. “But these
boys’d be armed to the teeth, sir. Rebels through and through, to
be sure, and they always travel in fair sized numbers. ‘Twould be
dangerous…for the ladies, of course…not to be going.”
“How many?” Nicholas addressed the
priest.
“Five on horse…I’d say about two dozen on
foot…I don’t know if I saw all of them or not.”
Nicholas took the reins of his horse from
the valet.
“Can I come with you, Nick?”
He turned in time to see his mother pull the
carriage door shut with a bang, squashing Fanny’s attempt to step
out. As Nicholas directed the driver to go straight to Woodfield
House, the valet took a place on the back of the carriage.
He turned to the cleric. “You…inside.”
Mumbling words of undying gratitude, the
bishop’s secretary yanked open the carriage door and jumped inside
with more nimbleness than his size warranted.
“The new magistrate, Sir Robert Musgrave,
has a bounty set on the heads of these boys,” the driver said in
confidential tones to Nicholas. “Word is, he’s planning to hang
every Shanavest he catches in the old Butter Market in Cork. Now,
if ye be asking me, that’s the wrong approach, what with most of
the popish farm folk loving those rebels as their own. But I’m just
a whip man…so what do I know?”
Lady Spencer poked her head out of the
window before the carriage pulled away. “You
can
walk away
from a fight, Nicholas. I am concerned for you. There are too many
of them…and this is a strange land.”
“No need to be concerned, Mother. I only
intend to get near enough to keep a close watch.”
“Then why not wait until the following wagon
arrives? With the servants to help you…”
“I’ll be fine.” He motioned for the driver
to move on. “Just keep a firm hold on that sister of mine.”
Nicholas waited until the carriage
disappeared along the bend of the road before climbing on his
horse. Drawing his sword, he spurred the animal down the road.
***
The edge of the knife’s blade formed a thin
white line in the ruddy wrinkled skin of the man’s throat.
The terrified bishop had offered everything
he could think of in exchange for his life—from having bags of coin
delivered wherever they wished…to waiving every church fee in the
diocese for an entire year. Baptisms, marriages,
funerals…everything.
They had accomplished what they had come to
do, so the leader of the group motioned for the men to withdraw.
The quivering cleric remained tied to the tree, his eyes tightly
closed, his mouth now moving involuntarily as he mumbled prayers
and promises with no particular rhyme or reason. The man’s fine
clothes were stained with muck. A few scratches on the face were
all that he’d suffered outwardly.
“The next time you think of making any deals
with the magistrate, just remember this day,” a young giant of a
man whispered menacingly in the bishop’s ear as he sheathed his
knife. “We can always find you.”
The leader watched the same member of the
Shanavest jab a fist into the cleric’s side before walking away.
The ropes restrained the man from bending over in pain, but the
grimace on the old face showed his distress.
The bag of coins was emptied. The loot taken
from the bishop’s carriage earlier was piled into sacks and carried
off. The group dispersed as quietly and unexpectedly as they had
come. In a moment, only the masked leader remained, sitting on his
handsome horse while the others got away.
****
With his mount tied to the branch of a birch
down the road, Nicholas watched from the safety of a grove of
pines. It was some time before the bishop lifted his head and
looked up at the solitary figure.
“Please don’t kill me!” the man pleaded as
horse and rider approached in measured steps. Nicholas’s fingers
immediately tightened around the hilt of his sword, and he moved
silently forward. The rebel leader had a single pistol tucked into
his belt, but Nicholas knew he might be able to take the man by
surprise, before he had a chance to draw and fire.
“I admit my guilt! I offer you every worldly
possession I have…I…” The man’s face drained of all color as the
rider quickly drew a knife from his belt. “I…I…”
Nicholas ran forward, but stopped just
before reaching the road when he saw the rebel lean down and cut
the ropes binding the bishop’s hands.
“Teach mercy and compassion to your people,
priest. They are virtues that are wanting.”
The voice was hoarse and low, and yet
something in the tone caused Nicholas to pause. He immediately drew
behind a tree again and sheathed his sword as the rider wheeled his
horse in his direction. He listened to the sound of hooves starting
up the road toward him.
As soon as the head of the horse passed the
tree where he was hidden, Nicholas moved forward quickly, taking
hold of the rider’s shirt and yanking him from the horse. They both
tumbled to the ground, the rebel’s pistol bouncing into the brush
at the side of the road.
Rolling away, the rebel leader picked up a
rock, but Nicholas was faster. As the other man hurled it at his
head, the Englishman raised a hand and deflected the gray slate
away from his skull. Ready to face him again, he was disappointed
to see his foe turn and run toward the woods. Without a second
thought, Nicholas took off after him.
The man was small, but extremely quick and
agile, and he moved speedily through the thick undergrowth.
Nicholas’s long legs, though, enabled him to overtake the rebel not
very far from the road. As he was about to tackle him from behind,
the outlaw swung around, kicking viciously at his groin. Nicholas
sidestepped the blow, and the kick struck him on the hip as he
closed on the man.
Falling forward, Nicholas connected with a
right hook a moment before leveling him with his body. Sprawled on
top of the masked man, he pushed immediately to a sitting position,
trapping the slight body beneath him and drawing back his fist to
deliver another blow. He froze.