A Woman of the Road Read online

  “Do not worry yourself!” I called, trotting off. “Vigorous exercise is what this doctor recommends!”

  “Damn you,” he growled, but kept most of his oaths to himself.

  Just as Jeffries had predicted, the king’s cavalry was fast behind, and after riding a brisk half-league, we heard the pounding of horses’s hooves.

  “Halt!” Jeffries shouted like the captain he was.

  We pulled on our reins and waited.

  “We may outrun them here but will be unable to do so all the way to Epping,” he said.

  “It is likely they have fresh horses,” said Carnatus.

  “That is why we make our stand here.”

  Jeffries pointed with a pistol to a familiar hill.

  “Ya!” he cried to his horse, and we all strove to keep up. “We shall conduct this raid as we would any other. There is one primary exception: we do not rob the king’s men.”

  “Damnit,” Carnatus mumbled.

  I nodded, loading my new pistol and testing the heft of my sword. This time, unlike Tyburn, I could be an aid to my friends.

  “Ready, lads?” Jeffries asked as ten mounted soldiers loped by in a cloud of rocks and dust. He raised his own blade as if he were at Edgehill.

  “CHARGE!” he cried, and we did so like a cavalry.

  Jeffries and Carnatus plunged to the foe’s left flank while Aventis and I closed in to their right. The red-coated soldiers kept up near-constant fire, and in the heat of the fight I did not know at first I was hit—on my lower left arm. Still, with Tyburn fresh in my mind, I gritted my teeth and kept on.

  “Separate them!” Jeffries cried, and we did, five against two on both sides of the road. Aventis whirled dual blades while the rest of us used ours to swat guns from the hands of men seeking desperately to reload. Though numbers were against us, we left two red coats I the dirt: then three, and finally six. The remainder threw down their weapons in what seemed like relief.

  “Is this how you defend your king?” Jeffries shouted, toeing one man’s boot with his own. “Prince Rupert would have had you flogged for lack of effort!”

  “Yes, sir,” said the downed soldier who spit out a mouthful of rocks.

  “Mayhap they should teach you lads how to keep your seat,” said Carnatus.

  “And not surrender like soft women!” added Aventis. He winced as he looked at me. “Sorry,” he breathed.

  I was so rattled by my new wound and the events at Tyburn that I barely heard him. Carnatus made short work of tying up the troops. He seemed especially tickled at using their rope for the task!

  I clutched my arm, blood now leaking onto my coat.

  “What of the wounded?” I asked between gritted teeth.

  “No need to fret,” said Jeffries. “This is after all the Great Western and someone will be along.”

  I nodded, then grimaced. Aventis’s sharp eye swept over my arm. He yanked off his falling band, using it as he had for himself to stem my oozing wound.

  “Alas, this must wait until Epping,” he said. Above his mask, his black eyes clouded.

  Jeffries returned to the bound men and threw them six handfuls of guineas.

  “When you are questioned, remember this,” he said. “For now, we must say adieu. Long live the king!”

  “God save him!” came the reply.

  After Jeffries and Carnatus mounted, we recommenced our ride. It was sixteen leagues to Epping—and for me, each seemed to last an age. Though my wound had been stemmed, it pained me with every stride, and I groaned from the saddle.

  “How fare you, Megs?” asked Aventis, loping up beside me.

  “The fare is fine,” I said dreamily, “though I loathe pickled salmon.”

  The concern in my friend’s eyes grew.

  “You must be strong,” he said, trying to mimic cheerfulness. “After Newgate and Tyburn, this must seem a trifle!”

  I nodded, clinging to my gray’s mane as my head fell forward.

  When I revived, reins still clutched in my hands, I saw we were in a wood. We had reached Epping, at last!

  Aventis made haste to leap from his horse and run to my side.

  “Megs, let me untie you!” he said, and proceeded to undo some knots. So that is how I had avoided the ground!

  He gently lifted me up and placed me on the grass. Yet, instead of administering aid, he dashed into the forest and was soon lost in the trees. Carnatus and Jeffries looked puzzled as they gazed down at my ashen face.

  “Steady there, Megs,” said Jeffries. “Luck has not been with you of late.”

  “That’s putting it mildly,” I mumbled.

  “I hate to place odds at such a somber time,” said Carnatus, “but I’d bet two to five that is a serious wound.”

  “Thank you,” I said.

  My body must have shut down, for I no longer felt pain, just an encroaching numbness.

  I did not know how long Aventis was away, but when he returned, he bore something in his hands. Kneeling beside me, he applied a foul-smelling salve to my arm.

  “Perhaps it does not seem so,” he said, “but you were fortunate, Megs. The ball exited your flesh, leaving but a broken arm.”

  Still, I grimaced.

  “What is that potion?” I asked, pointing to a yellowish liquid he held in a concave leaf.

  “Yarrow,” he answered. “If one believes the wise women, it is especially good for gunshots.” He tore off one of his cuffs and began to rebind my wound.

  “Why not apply live pigeons to his feet?” asked Carnatus. “I understand that works wonders.”

  “Perhaps a good bleeding with leeches,” added Jeffries.

  “I thank you, gentlemen,” said Aventis, “but let us adhere to this method at present.”

  He then set about making a splint from a branch, using some of his shirt as a brace. Poor man! With his clothes in tatters, he looked more the beggar than a count!

  “Now you must rest,” he told me, placing me full-length on the grass. “That arm should be mended in a matter of seven weeks.”

  “Seven weeks?” I groaned. “I am young—perhaps it will heal quicker.”

  “Perhaps,” Aventis chuckled.

  Now that my arm had been set, I felt pain at the point of the break. My grimace acted as a trigger—for Carnatus to hand me a cup brimming over with liquid.

  “Nothing dulls the hurt like a pint of heavy ale,” he said. “Or a good thrashing of one’s servant.”

  I could not speak for the latter but after I finished the brew, I could attest to the former.

  ‘S-speaking of servants,” I slurred slightly, “where the devil is Gad?”

  “I dismissed his useless flesh!” Carnatus said.

  “For the sixth time,” Aventis whispered. “And that is only for as long as I’ve known him.”

  “Five to three I hire him back!” Carnatus roared. “Any of you gentlemen willing to take the bet?”

  None of us were. Carnatus poured me another cup, which I gulped down quickly. To my shame, I found it made me garrulous.

  “Carnatus,” I asked, without my customary fear of him, “how . . . how came you to be a gamesman? W-were you always such?”

  He sighed as he stood before me.

  “Alas,” he said, “I was born under a betting planet! Before the age of sixteen, I had gambled away my inheritance.”

  “Oh no,” I said.

  “And my family seat. And coach. I once even pawned Gad to pay off a debt at the races.”

  “Good Lord!” Aventis breathed. “How much in total have you run through?”

  “Hmmm, let’s see . . . ” Carnatus counted on his large fingers. “Perhaps . . . six-thousand.”

  “Guineas?!” I cried.

  “They were not pence,” he said.

  My slightly dazed brain spun as I addressed him.

  “So you took to the road not out of necessity—”

  “It was necessary at the time,” he said.

  “What I mean is that all these
years you could have sat snug by your fire, your favorite hound at your side.”

  “And a drunk could have steady sober if only he did not drink,” said Jeffries.

  Carnatus smiled wryly, then noticed I seemed forlorn.

  “Do not cry for me, Megs,” he admonished. “There is no adventure so fine as watching the dice tumble or throwing down just the right card. And let us not forget women or eating the best fowl in England! Truly, I would rather bask in these pleasures than sit by my fire at York.”

  In one way, I understood him, but in another, I could not. Though riding the road was great fun and the guineas earned beyond dreams, what seemed the final consequence—be it Newgate, Tyburn, or both—must pale beside the gift of family wealth. Well, what did I know? I thought, shaking my addled head. The only “valuables” bequeathed me were endless beatings and chores . . .

  “Speaking of fires, let you and I go so we have reason to light one,” Carnatus told Jeffries, and they both went off in the woods, intent on catching some game.

  As usual, all this talk of another’s plight caused me to think on my own. Not my born estate, for that was set in stone: no, seeing Aventis kneel at my side, I bemoaned the other me: Margaret Tanner, woman. In my sodden state, it seemed my limbs had been overlaid with a man’s muscle, while my body went hard: Alas! With my love beside me, I felt more Hercules than Diana.

  “A-aventis,” I asked, hating what to my ears was the voice of a man, “do ya think of me as . . . as a woman? The same way as Mary and Moll?”

  Of course, I would not have framed such a query had the ale not loosened my tongue.

  “Why do you ask, Megs?” he said with perfect complacency. “Or since we are alone, I should say, Margaret.”

  Hearing him speak that name made me smile through the pain.

  “I like the way you say it,” I said, no longer hating the sound of my voice.

  “Of course you are like those women! Why would you not be.”

  “But . . . d-donning a man’s clothes, holding his weapons, r-riding th’ road—”

  “It is just a charade,” said Aventis, taking my good hand in his. “It no more makes you a man than if I affix a bridle and proclaim myself a horse!”

  I laughed, perhaps louder than I should.

  Sitting up, I peered into his face.

  “Thas’ not it!” I yelled, getting angry without a reason. “Do you—do you think I’m pretty?”

  His eyes sparkled.

  “Margaret, you will recall I saw the gifts with which Nature bestowed you.” He cleared his throat. “All of them.”

  I blushed, thinking back to that day on the Heath.

  “But I have seen nothing!” I protested rather nonsensically. “I do not think it fair!”

  Aventis laughed soundlessly as his shoulders shook. That really inflamed me.

  “Mother of God!” I cried, “if you admire me, are you still so priestly so as not to attempt a kiss? You, who bedded a queen!”

  Through my haze, I could see him color, but there was something else reflected in his dark eyes. He stared into the woods. Just when I thought I’d been forgotten, he dropped to both knees and put his lips upon mine. I moved my arm around his shoulders, feeling the muscle beneath his cloak. That kiss, my first real one, felt so sweet that I wished to prolong it as long as we two lived.

  He was the first to pull back.

  “Count,” I whispered, “I-I must tell you—”

  My feelings remained unspoken as our two friends marched out of Epping, both bearing a sturdy log from which hung a freshly killed buck.

  “What madness is this?!” yelled Carnatus, dropping his end of the burden as if it were made of fire. He wiped a hand across his eyes to dispel the unholy vision.

  “No more ale!” Jeffries cried, likewise dropping the buck and stomping toward me and Aventis. He seized the near-empty jug and turned it upside down. “You have both had quite enough!”

  “Are they drunk then?” Carnatus asked with some relief.

  “Ha!” said Jeffries dismissively. “So often I have seen this with soldiers—they get completed raddled and then think they embrace their sweetheart.”

  “Oh. So . . . there is nothing . . . untoward then?” asked Carnatus. Just to be sure, he retreated behind his kill.

  “Not in the least,” said Jeffries. “Why don’t you start gutting that buck? I could use a hearty supper.”

  Shrugging, Carnatus took out his dagger and applied it to the deer’s hide. Jeffries, looking stern, motioned for me and Aventis to follow him into the woods. The moment he halted, he lashed into Aventis.

  “Tell me, count—is that fine mind of yours capable of thought? Carnatus would have no compunction shooting both you and Megs. Is that your hidden desire?”

  Aventis looked down at the moss. The captain’s words had caused my arm to twinge, but that was nothing when he turned to me.

  “Megs!” he barked, as he had at the king’s soldiers. “It was you who begged to join me—as a tobyman, not a doxy! I believe I made that quite clear?”

  “Yes, sir,” I said softly.

  Now another real name was unfurled.

  “Conde Bernardino del Castillo,” said Jeffries, “your behavior shocks me to my marrow! Are you so depraved that you would corrupt a young girl? And what’s worse, a companion of the road!”

  The captain turned away in disgust.

  “I beg your pardon, Charles,” Aventis said. “I do not know how it happened. You have my word as a gentleman it will never do so again.”

  Jeffries nodded, the blood returning to his face.

  “Please comprehend,” he told both of us, “as your captain, I am duty-bound to protect you. And to keep our company whole.”

  “Yes, sir,” I said again.

  “Very well,” said Aventis, turning on his heel and leaving.

  Jeffries gave me a searching look before likewise returned to camp. As I stood there, surrounded by trees, I knew at last what I was. Not a man—that was clear. No, I was a woman whose feelings were forbidden and whose love could not be returned. This seemed worse than anything—worse than Newgate, getting shot, even Tyburn. But if I were to stay, I must resolve that this would be my future.

  1663

  Resolve it I did.

  In truth, Aventis made it easy for after that day, he would scarce look at me, and when he did, spoke as he would to a man. There was no heat in his glance or passion in his voice, and, hard as it was, I tried to model myself upon him. Though my insides protested, I maintained an outer calm, remaining as Megs-like as ever.

  Just as Aventis had said, my arm healed in seven weeks. It was such a relief to cast off that hated splint and its accompanying brace!

  During my convalescence, we had moved from hideout to hideout, which proved a successful strategy. Once I had recovered, Jeffries moved us to London. It seemed the same as always, with its noxious air and bustle, though perhaps the palace at Whitehall was a bit bigger and grander.

  “Has Charles really been back for three whole years?” I asked Jeffries. I still took joy in in the reopened taverns around us.

  “Yes,” said the captain, “and has, miraculously, not started a war.”

  “Give him time,” said Carnatus.

  “Not if the queen has a say,” Aventis drawled.

  I looked over at him on his horse. Did he still have the ear—or parts unknown—of the woman who was now Her Majesty? If he did, OI thought, I would surely be the last to know. Besides, Jeffries kept such a close watch us that Aventis would have to sprout wings if he wished to visit the palace. That was at least some recompense.

  It was thus in 1663 that I determined to lose myself in our band’s adventures. And we did have some fine ones . . .

  The first one of note passed on Salisbury plain, a popular spot for our trade due to its public coach. One fine spring day, our company hid behind rocks which were assembled in a wide circle.

  “How boring,” said Carnatus, looking up from hi
s saddle. “What pitiful knave thought to pile stone atop stone? Could they not have spent their time on something more amusing?”

  “Like Cribbage?” Aventis asked.

  “Or Hazard?” I said.

  “Shhh!” Jeffries warned, putting a hand to his lips. “Listen.”

  We heard our favorite melody then: the groan of wheels upon dirt. Jeffries drew up his reins as a plain black coach approached.

  “That’s our cue, lads!” he cried, a pistol now in each hand. We set out from behind the rocks with the fury of the Four Horsemen. That poor coach driver, a timorous sort, instantly fell from his box and prostrated himself in the dirt.

  “Brave man,” said Carnatus.

  “Do not hurt me, good sirs!” cried the driver. “I am a poor but honest man.”

  “The worst sort,” said Carnatus. He threw a rope from his saddle and casually ensnared his prey.

  “Your turn, Jeffries,” said Aventis.

  The captain approached the coach door.

  “Out with you!” he yelled. “Only do as you’re told, and I promise you’ll come to no harm.”

  The first to emerge on the road was a frightened young woman, her raiment none too fine (thank Heaven!). She offered an arm to her companion, a man at least twice her age. He possessed a strong face and wore what looked to me like a long fair wig. What struck me most was his gaze: distant and unfocused. It was clear that he was blind.

  “Stand and deliver!” cried Aventis, though I felt somewhat bad. We both dismounted and prepared to search our victims.

  “Please, sir,” said the girl, her lashes tinged with moisture. “We have nothing. My husband—”

  God’s legs! He looked like her father!

  “—has of late been hounded for supporting a civil state.”

  “You mean an uncivil one—like Cromwell’s!” Jeffries spat. “Hand him over, and I’ll set my hounds on him!” He gestured to me and Aventis.

  The woman moved closer to her husband as she hugged his arm.

  “Poor John was even arrested,” she said, “and I fear it could happen again.” She looked up at the captain, trembling. “We have no money, sir. Not ten shillings together.”

  “Yet you keep a coach,” said Carnatus, running a hand over its roof. Far more than the rest of us, he knew what such things cost.