Tidelands

“You’d better come back to the Priory,” Mrs. Wheatley invited her. “We’re going to be having a good dinner: Christmas or no Christmas.”

“Do come,” Rob supplemented.

“I’d better not,” Alinor said. “My brother wouldn’t like it. And Alys has to keep the ferry.”

“Just come for dinner,” Rob urged her. “I’ll come back with you and work the ferry on the evening tide.”

“Do let’s,” said Alys.

“Oh, very well,” Alinor said. “But we have to get back to the ferry for high tide this afternoon. You know that Christmas is not a holiday anymore.”

“It is at the Priory,” Rob whispered to her. “We keep to the old ways. You should see what Mrs. Wheatley has been cooking!”

Alinor took his arm and they walked side by side after the Peachey household towards the big house, Red trotting behind them, his tail waving like a standard.

“This’ll be my one and only Christmas at the Priory,” Rob reminded her. “Next year, I’ll be at Chichester.”

“And I’ll be married,” Alys chimed in from her mother’s other side.

Alinor, happy to be between her two children, hugged Rob’s arm, took Alys’s hand, and wondered where she would be next year, and if she would be walking to church with James carrying their child.

THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS, DECEMBER 1648

James spent his Christmas at The Hague with the advisors to the Prince of Wales, trying to convince them that they should not rely upon the king making an escape to avoid a trial.

“Why not? It is his wish,” one of the lords said impatiently to James. There were ten of them seated around a big wooden table. Too many, James thought: ten men who would pass on every word of this conversation to their wives, their servants, their mistresses, and their children. They had once ruled a country—they could not resist demonstrating their importance.

One of them leaned forward. “Once His Majesty believed our enemies might be brought to an agreement. Now we know they are completely false, so he is ready to leave. You have delivered our instructions? Our men are all working together, preparing escape?”

“It’s not a question of issuing instructions.” James hid his impatience. “I delivered the messages, but the man did not confide in me. He would not trust me, nor anyone. He did not want to work with me or with your other agents. There are not many of them left anymore. In London, all His Majesty’s known friends are watched. Many of them have given up. Only six months ago I met with men who will no longer open their doors to me.”

“Sir William Peachey?” one of the men queried.

James glanced towards the door. “I won’t say names,” he said.

“Well, you know who I mean. Won’t he help? He’s got a neat little port on his lands, hasn’t he?”

“Nothing more than a quay at high tide,” James said, thinking of the tide mill and Alinor’s cottage that faced it across the mire. “Anyway, he’s done enough.”

“You have money,” one of the men pointed out to him bitterly. “We have beggared ourselves in raising money. Can’t you hire someone?”

“I have done what you asked me. I’ve told you where His Majesty is housed and the arrangements for his trial. I gave your gold to the man who said he will attempt a rescue. But I am warning you that he may not succeed. His Majesty is well guarded, and the men who watch him are not for sale. The common soldiers used to respect kingship, but not now. I don’t think they can be bribed. So I don’t know that you can get him away. I beg you to start bargaining with the Cromwell government. That’s the only way we can be sure that His Majesty will be freed.”

“Freed? By their agreement?” a man said incredulously. “Are you forgetting that he is the King of England? I won’t haggle with criminals!”

“Bargain with Cromwell?” One of the lords raised a well-plucked eyebrow. “With Cromwell? Oliver Cromwell of Ely?”

Another man laughed scoffingly. “Where would they imprison him? In the Tower? It’s a royal palace anyway! You’re forgetting this is majesty. The moment they meet him face-to-face they will fall to their knees.”

James nodded, restraining his temper. “But what if they do not? They could well imprison him. It’s been done before. The newspapers and scandal sheets in London are filled with stories of Henry VI and Edward II, and that they were imprisoned and their thrones taken.”

“Henry VI!” a man laughed. “Who cares for Henry VI?”

“If they decide to house him in the Tower, it will be very hard to get him away,” James persisted.

“For God’s sake!” One of the men jumped up from the table. “Do we need a priest to come and give us a history lesson? You! Summers, or Avery, or whatever is your name, did we ask you to come and disappoint us?”

James rose too. “I am sorry not to be able to give you better news,” he said, controlling his rising temper. “I volunteered for this work and it is a thankless task. If you dismiss me I will go without another word. All I ask is that you do not speak of me, my name, or those I have worked with.”