On saturday john came home.
It was at the dead of night; I was abed, but not asleep. Neither was I fully awake; I lay in a kind of stupor, from which since Francis left me I had been unable to rouse myself. Too many contrary emotions battling in my heart, like great winds arrested by each other’s force, produced a tense and fearful immobility. Sometimes one gained in strength over the rest, and then my whole soul swayed sickeningly in its direction. There was a wonder whether I, Penninah Clarkson, my father’s daughter, had in truth broken my marriage vows and been unfaithful to my husband. Could it be true? I gazed at my act in horror and could not credit it. There was a dreadful shame that I had done this thing to John while he was serving a high cause in which we both believed; there was a guilt which pierced me like a spear whenever I looked at my innocent children. There was a wild grief that Francis had gone, for he must return, he said, to his company that night, and he had ridden away to where I could not reach him. There was also—God forgive me!—a secret shameful sweetness. I called on myself to repent, to confess my sin before God and admit its shame, but I knew my repentance was not whole and honest, because I could not wish my sin unsinned. My soul wished it, that it might throw off its deathly sickness, but my body rebelled, feeling glad and satisfied. So, the battleground of these conflicting passions, I moved about the house in a daze, or sat by the hearth idle, my hands drooping listlessly in my lap. The nights seemed endless, yet I rose from them unrefreshed.
As I lay there, then, neither asleep nor awake, staring wide-eyed at the darkness, I heard a rattle of little stones against my windows. At first it meant nothing to me, but when it came again my heart cried: “Francis!” and I sprang up and made a light, and threw on a cloak and hurried down and unbarred the door. It was John who stood there; and so I found myself thrown abruptly into the moment I had been dreading, the moment when I had to face my husband.
But I had not to meet his eyes or take his kiss, as I had feared, for he walked straight past me to the table, and threw down his hat and cloak. I followed, fear at my heart; for he seemed so frowning and sober that for a wretched moment I thought he knew my fault. But his frown was not for me; he was preoccupied with larger matters.
“Get me some food and a change of linen, Penninah,” he said in a low urgent tone, turning to me. “I must be down at Bradford again within the hour.”
Seeing I stood staring at him, for I was not quite able to turn my mind thus suddenly from my own deep perplexities to his, he added: “Quickly, wife. The Royalists will be at Bradford to-morrow, or at latest Monday. We must arm the neighbourhood against them.”
Then I remembered all his errand, and exclaimed, and bestirred myself, kneeling with the tinder-box to light the fire.
“And Sir Thomas?” I asked.
“He’ll be here as soon as he can,” said John in the same low hurried tone. “We must try to hold them off until he comes. They’re in force—Sir William Savile has procured three troops of horse and some ordnance and five companies of dragoons, and I don’t know how many foot, from the Earl, to come against us.”
“All against Bradford?” I exclaimed. “Such a small untenable town?”
“Aye—if they command the clothing towns the Parliament is lost in Yorkshire,” said John, setting his jaw. “The Fairfaxes will be cut off in the east—pushed into the sea. Be quick, Penninah. Some of the men down there seem inclined to leave us; if they go our state will be desperate.”
He took the two muskets down from the chimney and began to look at their priming. I ran to the kitchen and saw to his food, then went upstairs to get his linen. The chink of money drew me to the loom-chamber; John was there bending over his desk, counting some gold pieces. He looked up as my shadow fell across his hand.
“This is our children’s living, wife,” he said steadily, “that I am taking to pay a garrison; I know it well. But I think it better they should live free than rich.”
“God go with it,” I answered him. At that moment I wished with all my heart that I was a true and faithful wife to him. But because I am sinful in one thing, I thought to myself, that is no reason for me to be sinful in all; I need not totally forget my religion and the liberties of my country, because I have been once untrue to them.
While we were at table, John eating hastily, I heard a pattering noise behind me, and looking round, saw Thomas and Sam standing in the doorway, smiling and mischievous. As soon as they saw we had perceived them, they ran forward and threw themselves into their father’s arms. I felt that they were thus delighted to see their father because in their hearts—for children have a strange piercing understanding of grown folk’s minds towards them—they felt deserted by their mother. This saddened me; and then I suddenly saw my danger, and lest the children tell John first of Francis’s visit, I said quickly, though ashamed of my haste:
“John, Francis has been here.”
“Francis?” exclaimed John, and the same look, half affection and half vexation, crossed his face as used to come there in the old days at any mention of his cousin. “And what is Francis like after nine years?” he said.
“Much the same,” I began, striving to keep my tone indifferent, dreading lest my cheeks should burn. The children saved me.
“He had a scarlet coat and a feather in his hat,” said Thomas eagerly.
“And a sword and two pistols,” said Sam.
“And very long boots,” said Thomas. “And a cut on his arm. Mother tied it up.”
“I didn’t like him,” announced Sam downright.
“He spoke well,” conceded Thomas doubtfully, with an air of determining to be just however much it crossed his inclination.
“Their throat is an open sepulchre,” said Lister, appearing suddenly in the doorway. “They flatter with their tongue.”
“Since you’re awake, Lister, you might saddle Dolly for me,” said John over his shoulder.
“Their inward parts are very wickedness,” grumbled Lister, disappearing.
“Well—and what did Francis want at The Breck?” resumed John.
I forced myself to smile at him falsely over the children’s heads while I explained about the bursting of the gun and Francis’s wound.
“He dared not go into Aunt Sybil’s presence with a bleeding arm,” I said.
A reluctant grin spread over John’s face. “I don’t blame him for that,” he said. “But he’s our enemy now if he’s with Savile’s troop,” he went on, sobering. “Don’t let him in again. And you, boys, don’t go up towards Holroyd Hall. If you hear any firing, stay within the house. Do you hear what I say?”
“Yes, Father,” said Thomas dutifully.
“Can’t I go down to Bradford and help to fight?” asked Sam.
“No,” said John shortly.
Sam sighed but made no argument; he knew his father always meant what he said.
John rose and brushed away the crumbs, put the muskets under his arm and went out. Lister seemed a long time saddling the other horse, for it was a few minutes before we heard the hoofs going down the lane.
The busying of myself about household matters, and now getting the excited children back to bed, woke me from my numb daze, and when I returned to my own bed I could not sleep or rest, but tossed all night. My mind was in two parts, and I could not make one part conqueror over the other, however hard I tried, however long I prayed. A minor battle was waging in my heart, too, now, as to whether or no I ought to confess my sin to John; and although I knew very well that it would be wicked cruelty to destroy John’s happiness so, my conscience nagged me to confession, and some weakness in me urged that I could not bear that heavy secret long alone. But no, no! I would never confess it, never! So I tossed and turned. When at last it was day and I rose, I must have looked exhausted, for Thomas asked very tenderly if I was ill.
I had forgotten it was Lord’s Day till I saw my little sons in their best suits, but as soon as I saw them and remembered it, I knew what I must do. I said to Lister:
“I will go to church—Corker is gone, and the prayers will be read by the godly under-minister.”
Lister gave me a surly look from beneath his carroty locks; his freckled face was very pale this morning.
I repeated: “I will go to Bradford Church,” for indeed I had a great desire to do so. Though whether it was because I wished to be near John if he should be in danger, or hoped perhaps to catch some glimpse of Francis, or thought that in church I might discover what God had to say to me about my sin, I do not know; all three perhaps. “I will go to Bradford Church,” I said again.
“God is not mocked!” cried Lister raucously.
I looked at him, surprised by his text, which seemed unapt. Then I looked away again in horror, for I thought I saw in his face that he knew what had happened between myself and Francis.
“I will go alone. Do you stay here and keep the children close,” I said, my voice as strange as Lister’s own.
“Aye, go alone,” said Lister, sombre. “I will take no wicked thing in hand; a froward heart shall depart from me.”
But certainly he knew, I told myself despairingly; how could I ever have imagined that with a guest in the house Lister would stay quietly upstairs in the loom-chamber? He had descended during Francis’s visit, and spied on me, for sure! He knew. He knew. I drew myself erect and turned my gaze full on him, facing him down; his eyes fell before mine and he moved off in his awkward jerky gait, but he still muttered discontentedly. Eagerness to be out of his company was now added to my reason for wishing to go to church, and, scarcely pausing to say farewell to the children, I threw on my best cloak and hurried away down the lane to Bradford.
It was a bright clear day of strong frost, so that my footsteps rang on the hard ground. Whether because I was late or because of the troubled times, nobody seemed abroad besides myself. At first I was glad of this, for with such a secret as I bore it was a relief to be alone, but after a time the stillness and silence of the lane, usually at this hour of the Sabbath enlivened by the talk and footsteps of cheerful folk on their way to worship, began to weigh on my spirits, and I started at every small sound in tree and field. And presently, as a stone rattled again behind the wall and I imagined again I heard a stealthy tread, it struck me suddenly that my fears might not after all be idle; Bradford was within reach of war and I might be indeed followed by some Royalist spy. I stood and listened; the stiff grass, white with frost, on my left rustled and was abruptly still.
There was a pause; then a sandy topknot, a shrewd homely little face and a pair of wary eyes rose slowly above the stones.
“Why, Sam!” I said, laughing.
Sam scrambled over the wall and ran to my side.
“What are you doing here, child?” I said.
“I’m coming with you,” mumbled Sam, looking aside.
I knew it was useless to press him further; he was his father’s son, and if he had come for some deep reason very near his heart—to protect me, to seek his father, or in hope of seeing soldiers—he would never reveal it. “Well, come then,” I said, stretching out my hand. He took it eagerly, and I let him walk along beside me without further scolding or question.
The church bell was still ringing as we crossed the Turls, but few churchgoers were in sight, and those were mostly men, and looking very sober and downhearted. We managed to enter with the last group in sight, who were coming down from Barker End; they proved to be the family of grey-haired Mr. Atkinson, one of the clothiers who had come before to warn John of the Royalist plans. I told Mr. Atkinson, rather breathless from our haste, of John’s return with the message from Sir Thomas, late last night. He looked at me gravely, and said he knew it. “Your husband has been very active through the night, Mrs. Thorpe,” he said. Round the church door, to my surprise, stood a band of Bradford men in their working clothes, Isaac Baume among them. I wondered what they were doing there, and then Sam’s hand gave a sudden jump in mine, and I saw piled up against a nearby gravestone a heap of muskets, and against another all kinds of fearful-looking weapons with shining blades. I exclaimed at the sight, for I felt faint to think of those sharp knives being used against living men.
“Your husband says we must hold the church; it is the only tenable place in the town,” said Mr. Atkinson beside me. “Is Thorpe within?” he went on to Baume.
“No; he’s out with the sentinels—he’s posted them round the town,” said Baume.
“He learned all that from Black Tom Fairfax,” I thought, as Sam and I went into church. And at once a musical voice seemed to sound in my ear, saying: “A melancholy ass but a good soldier.”
To shake off such wicked thoughts I looked about me; there was but a scanty congregation, and what struck me as strange and ominous, not one of Royalist sympathies amongst them. There were no Ferrands, for example—but I must not think of that name. I busied myself with keeping Sam to good church behaviour, for he was apt to fidget and to peep between his fingers as he prayed, not being of a devout turn like his elder brother. Just as the under-minister entered, John strode in. When he saw Sam and myself he lifted his eyebrows and came and stood beside us, frowning.
“What are you doing in Bradford, Penninah?” he whispered sternly. “Bringing Sam into danger! There’s no knowing how soon the Royalists will be here. I told you not to leave the house.”
I had no answer for him. His seeming to value Sam’s safety so much before mine hurt me, and then I remembered that I had no right to be hurt by anything John said to me, and I bowed my head in shame and tried to gather my thoughts to repentance of my sin before God. But I could not; they fluttered hither and thither amongst carnal things, from Francis’s laughing eyes to the weapons at the door; and when I urged myself to remember where I was, I saw not God’s house, but what had happened to me there: Will’s arrest and my wedding and now John’s angry frown. Always before it had been pleasant to me to worship between my husband and my son, but now it seemed a misery too great to be borne. And then suddenly, while we were on our knees, the church door was thrown violently open, and Baume’s voice shouted:
“Thorpe, they’re here!”
Without a word John sprang to his feet and hurried down the aisle. I followed him, pulling Sam, who was eager enough to come; but soon we were delayed, caught in the confusion of the congregation, whose members, crying: “Here! So soon! God save us! Here already!” scrambled hurriedly from their knees and made for the door, jostling each other in their haste. Just then the church bell began to ring above our heads, very harsh and loud.
“The Lord of hosts is with us, the God of Jacob is our refuge!” shouted our under-minister staunchly.
“Amen, Amen!” cried John. “By your leave, friends! I am about the Lord’s business.”
At this the crowd, being honest and godly folk, drew back decently, and we found ourselves outside the church, at Baume’s side. Baume stretched out his hand and pointed; I shaded my eyes and followed his finger; sure enough, away up on the hill beyond Barker End, the wintry sunshine lighted on a gleam of steel and a flash of scarlet. I shivered, and Sam’s hand tightened in mine.
“Aye, that’s Savile’s lot, right enough,” said John grimly. He turned, spread out his arms to call attention, and shouted: “To your posts, friends! The enemy’s on us. We’ll give him a welcome he isn’t looking for.”
“That’s right!” cried the men.
There was a moment of confusion as those unable or unwilling to fight dispersed down the Bank, while the rest gathered round the weapons and picked out their own. “The best marksmen to the steeple,” cried John, raising his voice again, and at once some pushed past us into the church.
“Be off with you, Baume, over Coley way to Halifax,” went on John urgently, putting his hand under the clothier’s arm. “There are many there well-disposed to us. Fetch in all the men you can find.”
“They’ll all be at worship,” objected Baume.
“Aye; well; that makes it easier,” said John impatiently. “Go in to each congregation and acquaint the ministers of our condition here in Bradford; tell them to beg from the pulpit for the assistance of every godly and able man.”
“They wouldn’t stay with us last night,” grumbled Baume again.
“Now the enemy’s in sight they’ll see things different,” John urged him. “We’ll send to Bingley too—we’ll bring in the whole countryside. We must hold these malignants off till Sir Thomas reaches Bradford. Take my mare—she’s at the Pack Horse.”
Baume, compressing his lips doubtfully, nevertheless set off at a good pace down the Bank.
“Thorpe! Thorpe!” came a shout from above our heads. John stepped back and looked up; I did the same, and saw men crowding at the steeple windows, their musket barrels protruding in all directions like faggots in a bundle.
“Are we to give fire when we see them, or wait for their warning shot?” cried out one. “Or will you give the word?”
“Fire as soon as they’re within your reach,” shouted John. “They won’t expect resistance, and it may daunt ’em.”
With a beating heart, I watched the men raise their pieces and take sights along the barrels—the Royalists were too far to fire at yet, they called.
When I looked down again, Sam was no longer at my side. I supposed he had run back into the church, to see what was going on there, and so I followed him. Some of the men gathered there were looking to the priming of their muskets, some breaking the glass of the windows to give them room to aim, some tying scythes and sickles to long poles. All this was just what a boy like Sam would be eager to watch, I thought, but Sam was nowhere to be found. I felt I dare not go to John with such a tale, and began to search the church again, asking every group if they had seen my little son.
“I reckon I saw him a while ago, running off down Church Bank,” said Mr. Atkinson at length, coming kindly up to me with a fowling-piece in his hand. “A sandy-haired little lad, tall for his age, isn’t he? Aye, he went off down the Bank. Making for home, I dare say.”
Knowing my little Sam, I doubted this, but glad of any news of him I hurried away. At the foot of the Bank I heard my name called; turning, I saw Sarah Denton at her cottage door, dandling her latest baby in her arms, with her little girl and the other children clinging round her skirts.
“Have you seen my Sam?” I cried.
“He’s gone off to Little Holroyd,” said Sarah. “Our Sarah here saw him running by, and he told her he was bound for home.”
I was surprised but greatly relieved, for since the Royalists were coming from the east and The Breck lay south-west of Bradford, Sam’s course home took him out of their way.
“Stay a minute, Mrs. Thorpe, love,” urged Sarah. “You look quite peaked and out of breath.”
“Nay, I’d best go home,” said I, mindful of John’s orders.
“Eh, what are they up to now?” cried Sarah, shading her eyes and looking over my head.
I turned; and so both heard and saw a volley come from the muskets in the steeple. The noise was a heavy crackle, like a foot on breaking ice; the sight was very strange, for the short red flame seemed to start a foot or more away from the muzzle of the guns. There were shouts of applause from the direction of Kirkgate, and I looked there and saw a crowd of townspeople come out into the street to watch the fight; and there were angry shouts and cries from up at Barker End, and I looked and saw the hillside thick with scarlet and buff coats, some in ranks with pikes held vertically and colours, some lining the walls and the frosted hedges, some lying prone, some dragging a great gun out over the brow.
“That’ll be one of the Queen’s pocket pistols your father talks of,” said Sarah, pointing it out to her little girl.
“It’s a piece of ordnance, a cannon,” I said. “Oh, look! There is another.”
“Aye, they’re a pair. The men call them the Queen’s pocket pistols, in joke,” explained Sarah.
Her air of satisfaction maddened me; it seemed as if she cared not how great the danger was, since her Denton was safe out of the fight. The Royalists were now drawing their guns down into the shelter of two weavers’ houses which stood together on the slope; they planted them to point directly at the church, and wedged their wheels with billets of wood, and presently, as I supposed, charged one of them, for I saw a huge heavy black ball being thrust down its maw, and a buff-coat stood by its muzzle with a piece of lighted match in his hand.
“I wish John would go within the church,” I said uneasily, for I could see his dark head at the foot of the steeple, a clear aim for any marksman.
But now there came another volley of musketry from the church. The cannoneer with the match stumbled suddenly to one knee, the match flying as if thrown from his hand, and then he rolled over and lay full length, drawing up his legs as if he had cramp in his stomach, and then two other buff-coats came and lifted him away; and at this a great shout of applause arose from all the people across in Kirkgate. Then a Royalist on horseback with his arm bound up rode quickly out and seemed to instruct the gunners, stooping to them and waving his sound arm, and they moved away the billets of wood from the other gun, and turned its wheels with their hands, and rolled it out so that it pointed directly in a line with Kirkgate. Our men from the steeple gave out another volley, but seemed not to hit anyone, and we could see the Royalists charging this second gun—it was a sight to see how heavy the cannon-balls were to lift. Then the gun was ready and they all stood back, except one man who came forward with the match, and while he stood waiting for the word to fire there was a kind of silence, everyone waiting to see what the gun would do.
And through that silence, clear and loud and merry, came Francis Ferrand’s laugh.
God pity any woman who sees her husband and her lover as I did then! In that moment the truth I had been trying to keep at a distance closed on me and burned into my heart with a searing agony: Francis was there with the Royalists to take Bradford—certainly he was there, certainly, certainly! He was the officer with the bandaged arm—and John was there to defend it with his life; they were both in desperate peril, they would kill each other if they could; whichever side triumphed, I should be in the dust; my soul was for John, my heart for Francis. As the Royalist cannoneer bent over the breach I buried my face in my hands in anguish—but then I knew I could not bear to let either of those I loved out of my sight in such a fearful moment, so I let my hands drop and I raised my head and I watched them both with dry and burning eyes. There came a puff of smoke from the cannon, which looked grey against the frosted ground and then there was a great deep roar, a noise like thunder which made the whole air quiver, so that the house shook and my ear-drums pulsated; and then, across Kirkgate, there were screams, and people running and huddling together, and the corner of one of the houses crumpled at the roof like a piece of cake broken off by a child, and first two or three stones slipped apart and then the whole wall tumbled headlong. Immediately there came a crackle of musketry from the church, and then another deep angry roar from the other cannon, and great chips of stone flew from the base of the steeple, barely a yard, as it looked, from John’s head. A shuddering moan escaped from my lips, and Sarah, looking pale, seized my arm and tried to drag me in, but I shook her off; and as I watched, I saw John and the rest go into the church and close the door. The relief was so great that a faintness almost overcame me, my knees trembled, and I leaned against the door jamb, scarcely able to stand.
After these first exchanges in which each side, as it were, learnt the other’s strength, both Royalists and Parliamenteers settled to their hateful work and made their dispositions. Our men stayed close in the church, giving fire whenever the Royalists exposed themselves; the Royalists soon saw this, and seemingly had no mind to encounter unnecessary peril, for the main body drew off a little up the hill, waiting till the ordnance should finish the business, and of those left with the cannon, some sheltered by the weavers’ houses except when actually at work on the guns, and some went indoors and gave fire with muskets through the row of windows in the loom-chambers. We knew their presence there only by an occasional glimpse of a red sleeve or shoulder, and it seemed to me that they were safer in those small openings than our men in the large church windows, and that our men knew it, for they appeared and fired and withdrew all very suddenly, as if aware that they offered an easy mark. Thus the advantage of the height of the steeple was offset by the good shelter of the weavers’ houses, and neither side made much progress. And so the siege went on all morning: the cannon scouring Kirkgate and battering the steeple, and our men giving a rattling uneven fire whenever they saw a buff or scarlet coat, and the Royalist muskets replying on the instant ours appeared in the windows, firing all together very steadily. Between the firing Sarah and I looked at each other to see if we were still alive, and exchanged a word or two with her neighbours, who were also standing at their doors. I know not how I looked, for I know not how I felt; my whole being seemed gathered in my eyes, and when they no longer had occupation, there was nothing left of me. But Sarah’s face was keen and set; at each discharge from our men she cried out encouragingly: “Take that, you godless rascals!” and when a cannon thundered without doing harm, she exclaimed with great satisfaction: “God knows His own!” The folks in Kirkgate learned to run for shelter when the cannon was charged and ready to sound, so that few were hurt excepting once when a ball lighted on a tenter in a nearby close and the bars flew amongst the people; but the church could not move, its steeple began to look worn and spoiled, and the men at the windows grew fewer.
As the morning drew on towards noon, the conviction grew on me that the Royalists would win—there were so many of them, so well ordered, and their guns so great; and besides, Francis in any encounter had always seemed so much more able to come off best than John. When I thought of our men—decent, honest, God-fearing, liberty-loving men, who only wanted the right to obey their own consciences—shut up in the church, with only a few muskets and old-fashioned fowling-pieces, and not much powder, and no hope of any relief, Sir Thomas being yet miles away, my heart burned so with pity for them and hatred for the Royalists that I could scarcely contain myself, and a longing grew on me to scold Francis for a clock hour for his callous, selfish, high-handed, tyrannical ways. Bitter phrases formed themselves in my mind; I longed to turn him inside out to his own view, to expose his high-flown Royalist sentiments or the oppressive cruelty, the arrogant injustice, they truly were. But even as I thought thus, in imagination my tongue faltered, and I knew I meant to end my scolding like a woman, in forgiveness and a kiss.
About the time of noon, during a lull in the firing, we heard a kind of murmur from Kirkgate, and looking in that direction saw the folk there crowding to the open end of the street, whence they could see the Turls. They were pointing and talking.
“What’s going on there?” wondered Sarah, craning her neck.
“Perhaps the men from Halifax are coming!” I exclaimed.
We waited eagerly, and soon my expectation seemed to be fulfilled, for a band of men appeared at the foot of Church Bank, the sunshine flashing on some weapons they were carrying. But they were few, and walked along together in an unaccustomed haphazard way, very different from the military motions of the Royalists.
“If that is all a big town like Halifax can do,” began Sarah in a tone of great disgust, “God root it out for a nest of black-hearted malignants.”
“There’s Uncle Lister, Mother,” piped up her eldest little girl, pointing.
The child was right; it was our Lister who headed the band, and the rest were all Little Holroyd men. The poor lads, ignorant of how things were going, began to march right up the middle of the Bank towards the church, forming a mark for the Royalists as easy to hit as a haystack, once they should come within musket-shot. We all called to them and beckoned, and the men from the steeple shouted too—I saw John leaning from a steeple window, waving, then cupping his mouth in his hands to shout in an exasperated way: “Lister!” The Holroyd men stood still, bewildered; then all of a sudden the bullets began to sing past their ears, and they understood their danger and ran for shelter. Lister and some others came tumbling down on top of us, unhurt. I saw now that they carried scythes and sickles and such-like homely weapons; Lister held a notable long pike which seemed familiar to me, when I looked more closely I saw that it was the sharp blade of our spit tied to a pole.
Sarah and the neighbours began to make much of these men, additions to the defending force.
“How did you know you were wanted, lads?” called out a woman next door.
“The hand of the Lord was laid on them,” replied Sarah austerely.
“Nay—it was your little Sam fetched us, Mrs. Thorpe,” said one of the men, who in better times had woven for us, laughing. “He told us Mester Thorpe said every God-fearing man in t’district were to go at once to Bradford kirk. He’s a grand little lad, is yon—he went all round Little Holroyd and fair shamed us into setting off.”
“Where is Sam now?” I asked quickly. “Lister! Where are my children now?”
“I’ve locked ’em both up in t’kitchen,” said Lister. “They’re safe enough.”
His tone was so rough and unmannerly that all there looked at him in astonishment that he should address me so. He was as white as a sheet beneath his freckles, his teeth chattered and he continually cracked his great knuckles, ill at ease.
“Are you afraid, Uncle Lister?” piped up little Sarah.
“Though an host of men were laid against me, yet shall not my heart be afraid,” chanted Lister loudly. “When the Lord calls, the godly man will not be wanting.”
God forgive me, I did not believe him; perhaps I even let my smile show my contempt. It was the last time I ever smiled at Lister. The other men joked him cheerfully on his military spirit, as they called it, being honestly aware that they were afraid themselves.
Suddenly a great shouting from the steeple belaboured our ears. While we had been busy with the band from Little Holroyd, the attention of our men in the steeple had been on them too, and the Royalists had boldly taken advantage of this diversion to send a company on foot down the field towards our row of houses. They were almost on us when the men in the steeple saw them; they gave fire at once and shouted, and the church door opened and some of our men ran out, but it was doubtful whether they would be in time, and if the Royalists had our houses, the church would be quite cut off. The men from Little Holroyd saw they were called to action; they stood up and took hold of their weapons, but then looked about them uncertainly.
“Let God arise and let his enemies be scattered!” screamed Lister suddenly, and—his eyes glaring, foam at the corners of his mouth—he sprang out into the road and charged fiercely up the Bank, holding his pole before him like a pike. “In the name of the Lord will I destroy them!” he chanted, and the others followed, brave enough now they knew what to do. The Royalist captain, like a good officer, was running well ahead of his men with his sword drawn; “Come on then and be hanged to you!” he cried, and Lister, screaming: “Thou shalt bruise them with a rod of iron!” ran at him full tilt and struck him a sweeping blow with the pole. The captain lost his feet, the sword flew from his hand; as he stretched to retrieve it his hat fell off, so that I saw his golden head as the other men closed round him. There was the sound of blows, wood on leather and steel on steel; I saw him struggle to his feet, but they beat him down again. Then from the ground a clear high voice, half laughing, half in earnest, cried:
“Well, you have me! Quarter!”
And then there came a sudden sharp cry of pain and fear, and the voice, in earnest this time, repeated:
“Quarter, you fools! Quarter!”
“Aye, we’ll quarter you!” screamed Lister madly, and he drove the spit through Francis’s heart.
A long scream of agony tore the air asunder; I shall never forget that scream as long as I live.
I do not altogether know what happened then. There was a sudden rush of Parliament men up the hill—they were the long-expected men from Halifax, I learned later—and somehow I was amongst them; and the Royalists fell back and these Halifax men swept on into the church; and then I was kneeling there beside Francis, who lay stretched upon the ground, his bright face queerly slack and drooping, his fine coat stained; and Isaac Baume knelt at my side. Francis gave a sudden twist in my arms and looked up at me, his grey eyes very wide and staring, and seemed about to say my name, but instead let his head fall back as if he were too tired to hold it up, and sighed, and was silent.
After a moment Baume said soberly: “He’s gone,” and rose from his knees.
There was a hush; then the leader of the Halifax men said sharply to Lister:
“But what were you about, man? He asked for quarter.”
“Quarter?” muttered Lister stupidly. He stood staring down at Francis, with a face so tallowy white his freckles showed on it like coarse brown blotches; his hands hung down, and the pole with them, so that the blood dripped from the end of the spit to the floor. “Quarter?” he repeated.
“Aye, quarter! He surrendered—we all heard him—not to give quarter is against all the usages of war,” explained the Halifax man impatiently.
“The word does not bear that sense in Holy Writ,” said Lister, obstinate. “Every idle word men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. Quarter!”
“They’ll make us pay for this, I’ll wager,” said the Halifax man in a vexed tone.
“They’ll storm the church if we don’t look about us, Hodgson,” said John’s voice from behind, sardonic.
“Will you try a sally, then?” asked Hodgson, who seemed a knowledgeable man in military matters.
“Aye! Now, while they’re daunted. After their next discharge,” said John.
His words were drowned in the roar of the cannon. The hush which followed was sharply broken by shouted commands and a flurry of footsteps, and John opened the church door, and they all poured out after Hodgson.
“Come on, man!” said Baume to Lister, clapping him on the shoulder. “There’s no need to grieve over a malignant quarter or no quarter.”
Lister shook his head and muttered: “Quarter!” but suffered himself to be led out, stumbling and awkward.
Then all sounds died away, save for the groans of some wounded men who lay propped against the wall, amongst whom I dimly remember seeing Mr. Atkinson; and all the world seemed empty, save for myself and Francis.
I knelt beside Francis and raised him in my arms, I took his head on my breast, but it hung down heavily; I called him by name: Francis, my love, my darling, Francis, my sweet heart, my own dear lad. I begged him to speak to me. It seemed cruel that he would not speak to me, would not call me Pen, would not kiss me or caress me. He seemed hardly to know that I was there beside him. I stroked back the thick golden hair from his forehead—I can see it yet, springing back so strong and curling; I kissed his eyes, his mouth, his cheek, his hands. But they were cold, so cold; I warmed his hands in mine, but they were cold and heavy. To have him so close in my arms, after lacking him so long, and yet he would not speak to me! It was cruel, cruel. Francis, speak to me! Francis!
After a long time I felt a hand resting gently on my shoulder, and heard a voice murmuring quietly in my ear. When I became aware of them, I knew they had been there for a long time. “Mrs. Thorpe, Mrs. Thorpe,” said the voice, a kind homely voice; and after a while it broke a little, and whispered: “Mistress Penninah!” Then I looked up and saw a scarlet Royalist coat, and above it an oldish friendly face I used to know; it was Ralph, the Ferrands’ servant, and what seemed strange to me then, his eyes were full of tears.
“It’s Ralph,” I said dully.
“Yes, it’s Ralph, Mistress Penninah,” said the man in a fond soothing tone. “See, Mistress; it will be best for you to go home now, before Mr. Thorpe and the rest return. They’re off pursuing our men now, but I reckon that won’t last long, they’ll be back on their necks, soon enough. You go home now.” I put out a finger and touched his coat. “I’m Master Frank’s body servant,” said the man, answering my unspoken question; and at my dear love’s name his face contracted. “I let myself be captured,” he went on in a high trembling tone, “so as to be with him. But you’d best leave him now if you value your good name, Mistress.”
He took off his scarlet coat and made to put it over Francis’s face.
Then I knew that Francis was truly dead, and gone from me for ever, and I held Ralph back, and, trembling, for I had never done this office for anyone before, I drew down the lids over my love’s blank eyes. My tears fell on him, and I raised my skirt and wiped them from his face. Then Ralph covered him, and put his hand beneath my elbow and urged me to my feet, and gently drew my cloak together to hide my dress where it was stained with Francis’s blood. But still I could not bring myself to go, to leave Francis.
There came sudden footsteps and loud cheerful voices, and the Bradford men with Isaac Baume, and the Halifax men with Hodgson, and the Little Holroyd men with John, were all round me in the church, laughing and talking. They breathed heavily, and their faces were thick with sweat; some of them were wounded, with blood on face or arm, but all seemed very proud of themselves and their exertions.
“I’ve never seen such a skirmish in my life!” exclaimed Hodgson in a tone of high delight. “Fifty men to pursue a thousand! We must have been mad or drunk to hazard it.”
“It’s true we shot as if we were mad,” said John grimly.
“And the enemy as if they were drunk,” cried Baume, with a loud foolish laugh.
“Your husband has done notable execution, Mrs. Thorpe,” said Hodgson, catching sight of me. “When I saw you surrounded by those three, Thorpe, I own I feared for you. But he discharged his musket on one of them, Mrs. Thorpe, struck down the horse of another with the thick end, and broke the third’s sword, beating it back to his throat; and so put all to flight and returned safe to you.”
They all laughed again, so that I felt a strong repulsion from them; it seemed to me that they were drunk with killing. Behind them I caught a glimpse of Lister; to do him justice he looked white and dazed, but his mouth, like the rest, was set in a silly grin, so that I felt sickened.
“If it is safe now, I will go home,” I said in a low voice.
John turned and gave me a strange hard look. “Aye, go home, Penninah,” he said. “Go home and keep close. And you, Ralph, go with her. You are my prisoner on parole. See you break this news gently at the Hall, Ralph,” he went on, with a disparaging motion of his hand towards Francis.
“Was the Captain a friend of yours?” said Hodgson at this, lifting the coat from Francis’s face.
“Not a friend,” said John harshly, turning away. “A cousin.”
“He seemed a bold, gallant officer,” said the Halifax man, dropping the coat. “Pity he couldn’t have been better persuaded.”
John made no reply.