A Stormy Peace Page 15

  ‘His chateau?’

  ‘Yes, and he’ll be travelling under an assumed name, with a British passport. His English is good enough to convince most Frenchman that he is English. But from what you’ve told me, you’d best try to keep him away from the ladies and make sure he keeps himself under wraps.’

  Anson raised his eyebrows once again. He had heard that before.

  *

  They pored over the map and Redfearn indicated where his present knowledge was weak in terms of Channel port defences, dispositions of warships, numbers and types of vessels laid up there that would be suitable for carrying troops and artillery.

  He explained: ‘We can use the peace to keep up to date not only with what the French are up to in their Channel ports, but politically in Paris too.’

  Anson protested: ‘I can note what vessels are in Calais and so on well enough, sir, but I’m no politician and won’t have a clue what’s going on in their corridors of power.’

  Redfearn nodded. It’ll be a bit more than counting ships. We need to know their state of readiness, morale etcetera, nuances of the political situation and so on.’

  ‘But I’m a simple sailor and know nothing of politics, nor have I any wish to...’

  ‘Come, come, Anson. We both know you are not as naive as you make out. Just do what I know you normally do: ask a lot of questions, note what the senior people are saying, who they are allied with, any personal weaknesses and so on.’

  Anson was puzzled. ‘Personal weaknesses?’

  ‘Yes, who’s living beyond their means, drinking too much, mistresses, sexual peccadillos, that sort of thing.’

  ‘I thought most Frenchmen had mistresses and peccadillos. Look, sir, I don’t think I’m cut out for that sort of intelligence-gathering. The military stuff, yes, but sniffing around the upper echelons simply isn’t me.’

  ‘Hurel has already been asked to do the same, among other things...’

  ‘But I can’t put the rest of the party in any danger. There are ladies involved.’

  ‘You’re not the only ones who’ve been asked to do this, and on your return we will debrief you — and others — put all the jigsaw pieces together and, I hope, build up an overall picture that we can exploit when the peace ends, as it surely will. As long as you are discreet, there’s no danger. What could go wrong?’

  Redfearn made his farewells and left on horseback for Dover, leaving Anson pondering how he could perform such tasks without endangering the whole party and ending up in a French prison, with the rival intelligence service extracting information from him while pulling out his fingernails.

  But he felt he had been unable to refuse to help, and so be it. If he just kept his eyes and ears open, he should be able to observe enough to satisfy Colonel Redfearn without exciting attention from the other side, retain his fingernails — and get the party home safely.

  As the colonel had said, what could go wrong?

  26

  The Match

  Heading the little procession into the small village square was Josiah Parkin’s coach, driven by Dodman, with the retired banker, his niece Cassandra, Elizabeth Anson and Captain Amos Armstrong on board.

  Close behind was Tom Marsh’s pony and trap with Anson and Sam Fagg, and bringing up at the rear was a hired wagon drawn by two heavy horses with a dozen Sea Fencibles drawn from various detachments.

  Anson looked this way and that, spotted the sails of a mill down a narrow lane leading off from the square and announced: ‘Ah, there it is! We’ll lead the convoy in.’

  Tom Marsh pulled out in front of Parkin’s coach and Anson waved to the others to follow them up the lane.

  As they neared the post mill Anson could see it was mounted on a huge upright timber that gave it its name. A man he took to be the miller and a lad who could be his son were pushing against a long beam fixed to the mill’s wooden steps. This puzzled him, until he deduced that they were swinging the whole building round to keep the sails facing the wind.

  He had never thought about it before, but as a sea officer he understood straight away how this ingenious machine — for that was what it was — had been cleverly designed to harness the wind. No doubt when the sails rotated, they turned a shaft from which the power could be taken off to drive millstones and grind grain into flour.

  It reminded him very much of a warship, a great creaking, groaning wooden monster driven by sails and totally reliant on the vagaries of the wind unless worked by men who knew their business.

  Watching the miller and his young helper straining at the tail-post, his mind turned to ways of doing without the need to turn the mill by muscle power. A cap on top of the mill that could turn independently, powered by a fan-tail, was the obvious answer and although he was yet to see one, he had heard of so-called smock mills that had such a device.

  He was jolted back from his musings by a group of cavalrymen, well-mounted and sporting scarlet jackets and high-plumed helmets, overtaking them at the trot. Members of the yeomanry team, no doubt.

  The Sea Fencible procession followed the troopers into a large field beside the mill and they were ushered to one side of a small pavilion where wooden benches had been set out.

  On the other side of the pavilion, Anson noted, was a long rail beside the hedge where the troopers were tying up their mounts, and more wooden benches.

  It being a treat, there were trestle tables of food, covered in cloths to await tea-time, and a barrel of beer guarded by a sergeant he recognised from his clash with the yeomanry troop led by Captain Chitterling on the way to the Mote Park royal review several years earlier.

  Armstrong was first out of the coach, to be greeted by Colonel Bumstead of the South Kent Yeomanry, who proceeded to introduce him and his companions to his own officers and their ladies.

  Anson noticed to his horror that Chitterling was there with Charlotte, who was followed by a nurse pushing a new-fangled perambulator over the bumpy grass to seats in front of the pavilion. He could not avoid bumping into her at some stage during the proceedings, so when her husband moved away to greet some other new arrivals, he took the bull by the horns and approached her.

  ‘Good day to you, er, Charlotte. I believe I should congratulate you on your marriage?’

  ‘And the birth of our son?’

  He flinched. ‘Our..?’

  She gave him an amused pout, clearly knowing exactly what effect her words had on him. ‘Yes, Captain Chitterling and I have a son. Hadn’t you heard?’

  ‘No, I’m afraid I’ve been away a good deal.’

  Chitterling appeared, his elaborately-brocaded jacket and scarlet sash now discarded for the match, but still in his overalls with vivid red stripes down the side. ‘Why, it’s jolly Jack Tar! Still sniffing around me wife, eh? Can’t leave her a moment without you randy sailors latching on to her scent.’

  Anson tried hard to keep his cool, asking: ‘So you play cricket, as well as all your other accomplishments?’

  ‘Normally stick to huntin’ and shootin’. Only agreed to play when I heard you’d be in the navy team. Couldn’t resist the chance to give you a thrashing, whatever the weapons, eh?

  Turning on his heel, Anson muttered grumpily: ‘We’ll see about that.’

  *

  Having won the toss, Armstrong elected to bat and to set an example sent himself in first, accompanied by the only other officer in the team: Anson.

  All eyes were on the captain as he faced the first ball, delivered by a wiry trooper who had the look of an experienced cricketer, which he was, having turned out for the county on a number of occasions.

  His pitched-up delivery was edged by Armstrong into the long grass at the edge of the field and he called to the day-dreaming Anson, ‘Run!’

  Startled, Anson galloped to the other end and was about to embark on a second run when he spotted his captain’s raised hand bidding him to stop. He looked round to see that the ball had been retrieved and was back in the bowler’s hand.

  Now at t
he receiving end, he held his curved bat awkwardly in front of the wicket and awaited his first ball.

  Released from the bowler at great velocity, it struck the edge of what had until very recently been an active molehill and cut viciously back towards his stumps. Anson attempted to play what he imagined to be a forward defensive stroke but missed completely.

  There was a loud groan from the watching fencibles and he turned to see one of his stumps leaning back and the bail on the ground. ‘Out!’

  Mouthing a curse, and to an ironic cheer from the enemy fielders, he made his way slowly back to the pavilion, passing the triumphantly-sneering Chitterling along the way.

  He was still having his bruised ego polished by Parkin and Cassandra when young Tom Marsh hopped over on his crutches.

  ‘What is it, er, Tom?’ Now that the Sea Fencibles were disbanding, Anson felt he should dispense with formality.

  ‘Message for you, sir. From Mister Shrubb.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘He wants to see you, sir, face-to-face like — and it’s urgent, he says.’

  ‘Where is he?’

  ‘Over at the chapel. I’m to take you in me pony and trap.’

  Anson shrugged. It was a nuisance. He could happily dispense with the cricket but had looked forward to spending some time with Cassandra and her uncle, talking over their Paris excursion. However, Shrubb was not the kind of man who summoned an officer willy-nilly.

  He explained to Parkin: ‘Do excuse me. Phineas Shrubb wants to see me and, knowing him, it could be important, some kind of medical emergency perhaps. I’ll be back as soon as I can.’

  Cassandra smiled. ‘Hopefully in time to see your team win?’

  ‘After my pathetic contribution, that would take nothing short of a miracle!’

  He walked beside Tom Marsh, hurrying to keep up with the cripple who moved remarkably quickly on his crutches.

  As he embarked in the trap at the field gate and they set off down the lane he was just in time to see Armstrong hit the ball over the hedge to the cheers of the Sea Fencibles and their supporters.

  27

  A Plea for Help

  Phineas Shrubb was waiting for them beside the small Baptist chapel with another equally soberly-dressed man at his side.

  ‘Lieutenant Anson, thank you for coming. I could not be seen at a cricket match, you see?’

  Anson could not suppress a grin. He knew that the Baptists strongly disapproved of cricket, among a longish list of other pastimes, and wondered to himself what was so sinful about it. Boring, yes, but sinful? And Anson had thought a veteran of the American war like Shrubb would have been more of a man of the world.

  He climbed down from the cart and Shrubb shook his hand. ‘This is Brother Finch, from the Woodhurst congregation. We know each other through the Baptist Association.’

  Anson was aware that Kentish Baptist congregations maintained close links, with representatives meeting together regularly to discuss matters of common interest.

  The stranger offered his hand and Anson shook it, asking: ‘What can I do for you, Mister Finch?’

  But Shrubb put a cautionary finger to his lips. ‘May we go into the chapel? Even hedgerows have ears, but we will not be overheard in the house of God.’

  Anson was about to say ‘except by God, presumably’ but checked himself. Although Phineas was a former surgeon’s mate used to naval badinage, when it came to his religious beliefs his humour threshold was easily breached.

  Inside the chapel they sat on plain wooden benches and Anson took a look around. As the son of an Anglican clergyman he had never set foot in a nonconformist chapel before and was surprised at how simple it was.

  It bore no comparison to his father’s twelfth-century church, with its colourful stained-glass windows featuring Saints Cosmos and Damian, pioneer makers of prosthetic limbs, and the extravagant memorials — including his own that had been unveiled when it was thought he had been killed in France.

  They sat on a bench and Anson asked again: ‘So, what can I do for you?’

  Finch hesitated, but Shrubb reassured him. ‘Lieutenant Anson is totally trustworthy. Tell him what you have told me, brother.’

  ‘Well, sir, the problem is that our village is being terrorised by a ruthless gang of smugglers and we are in dire need of help.’

  Anson sighed. He had been on a smuggling run himself, as a way of getting to and from France to gather intelligence just before Nelson’s Boulogne raid, and he was aware that some of his own fencibles dabbled in free trading.

  ‘Look, Mister Finch, I am a sea officer, not the law. You should talk to the revenue people...’

  Finch shook his head. ‘What would they do? Send a few men, or even a troop of dragoons for a few days? Then, as soon as they left the gang would be back to take their revenge.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Shrubb offered. ‘A troop of dragoons would have to be stationed in the village on a permanent basis, and that’s not going to happen.’

  ‘Can’t your people get along with the smugglers like everyone else?’ Anson asked. ‘What’s so bad about that?’

  Shrubb answered for the Woodhurst man. ‘One of their elders was badly beaten for not cooperating with a gang from Romney Marsh, and when the villagers objected the smugglers threatened to burn their chapel to the ground.’

  ‘That was extreme, I’ll grant you.’

  ‘Look, these are simple, God-fearing people. But they’ve turned the other cheek for too long. The threat to burn their chapel was the last straw and they’re now more determined than before to refuse to let the smugglers borrow their horses or use their barns to store contraband.’

  ‘But no doubt you’re going to tell me that the gang won’t leave it at that?’

  Finch nodded. ‘They’ve threatened to come back in a few weeks and if we don’t all agree to cooperate by then they’ve said they’ll kill all the elders and burn down not only the chapel but the houses of anyone who resists.’

  ‘Surely they won’t do that!’

  ‘They surely will,’ Shrubb countered, ‘because if they don’t make an example of the Woodhurst men, why, others elsewhere will think they can get away with defying them too and they would lose their grip over the whole area. That’s how it works.’

  ‘Look, I sympathise, but as I’ve already said I’m not the law so I don’t see how I can help.’

  ‘Knowing you, Mister Anson, I thought now that there’s peace and the Sea Fencibles are being disbanded you might go with a few trusted men and advise the villagers on how to defend themselves.’

  ‘To form them into some kind of militia?’

  ‘If that’s what it takes. These are God-fearing, peace-loving men. They’ve no knowledge of weapons or warfare. Perhaps with some basic training, rather like the way you’ve trained the Sea Fencibles...?’

  Anson could now understand why they had approached him. But however sympathetic he felt, the fact was he was now committed to go to France — and not merely as a tourist, but with a mission to fulfil for Colonel Redfearn.

  He pondered for a moment before responding. ‘Seeing it’s you who’s asking, Phineas, I would have agreed to do what I could to help. But I’m shortly going over to France, part pleasure it’s true, but also on, er, official business.’

  Shrubb nodded understandingly. No doubt he could guess what the official business might be. The Woodhurst man did not, and tried further persuasion.

  ‘These men are ruthless, sir, with no religion or scruples, threatening to burn down a house of God and near killing an unarmed man who refused to commit a criminal act.’

  ‘Can you not appeal to whoever leads these men?’

  ‘We’ve no idea who the overall leader is — someone down on the Marsh, we assume. But the leader of those who threatened to come back and kill us is a Scotsman they call Billy Black, although I doubt that’s his real name.’

  Anson’s interest was pricked. ‘Scottish? Can you describe him?’

  ‘H
e’s short, but thick-set with a bull neck, broken nose, and he’s completely bald. Looks like he shaves his head.’

  ‘And he’s got some wording tattooed on his neck?’

  ‘How did you know? You’re right, sir, but I don’t know what it says because it’s gone sort of dark blue and wrinkled like they do, and he’s not the kind of man you want to get too close to.’

  Anson smiled grimly. ‘I think you’ll find it says “Death to Sassenachs!” and if I’m right, this man’s real name is MacIntyre and I’ve met him twice. The first time he punched me without warning and on the second occasion he tried to kill me.’

  No-one was more astonished than Shrubb. ‘So he’s the man who knifed you in the Mermaid at Seagate?’

  Rolling up his sleeve, Anson revealed the long scar on his forearm that had been tended by Shrubb himself.

  ‘One and the same. Black Mac, as my men know him, must be brought to justice. He’s a deserter from the navy, and wanted for attempted murder — of me!

  Shrubb and Finch exchanged a relieved glance. ‘Then you’ll help?’

  ‘Look, I’ve explained that much as I’d like to, I cannot get involved personally because I must go to France, but—’

  ‘You’ll send some of your men to help these people?’ Shrubb asked anxiously.

  Nodding, Anson levelled with him: ‘Right now I haven’t got any men. My detachment’s being disbanded, but once the boys know it’s to sort out Black Mac there will be no shortage of volunteers! I can think of two in particular.’

  *

  Anson spent a good deal of time quizzing Finch about Woodhurst and agreeing the outline of a plan to defend the village, a role he would entrust to Tom Hoover and Sam Fagg.

  It was therefore much later when Tom Marsh drove him back to the cricket field in the pony and trap that they passed a straggle of riders coming the opposite direction.’

  ‘Must be over?’ young Tom suggested.

  Anson agreed. ‘And the yeomanry off home after their great victory, no doubt.’

  But when they entered the ground it was plain to see that it was the Sea Fencibles who were celebrating and tackling the food and ale with great enthusiasm, not their opponents.