31

G radually Alice finds her sight adjusts to the dark. A barn owl, ghost-white, glides past. Shapes of trees, banks, even sheep dotting the fields emerge from the blackness, providing markers along the way. Rustlings in the undergrowth on either side speak of small animals going about their night pursuits, and the occasional bark of a fox intrudes on the constant clop of hooves, the clink of harness. Her confidence rises as they progress through the miles; at this pace they will be in Sherborne before midnight. For Wat, she thinks, not expecting them, the wait for dawn must be harrowing beyond belief, and she tries to imagine his relief when the gaoler unlocks and tells him his friends have come, he is free…

Then a badger shambling across their path causes Sir Thomas’s finely bred mount to back and shy. The baronet’s man riding a little ahead becomes more assiduous in alerting them all to unexpected hollows, collapsed verges, overhanging branches.

By the time Holnest is passed their progress feels positively brisk, and a short way on, climbing steadily, Longburton is soon a ribbon of shadow ahead. Not the slightest glow of a rush-light shows in any window as they pass. Alice pictures inhabitants roused from sleep, wondering about the body of riders passing through in the dead hours. No one is likely to accost them; those out on moonless nights tend to neither ask permission nor suffer hindrance. It reminds Alice of a time as a child, being held quietly in her bed in the dark by her mother, the sound of her father moving round the house to check bars on door and window, her questions hushed into silence as a long string of horses, hooves muffled with cloth, passed Hill House. The solid clomp spoke of heavy loads, the men with them using hoarse urgings to keep the line moving. That is the only experience Alice has had of smugglers. Such men have a short way with witnesses.

And so they pass unchallenged through Longburton. In a couple of miles, she fancies she can see the buildings of Sherborne down the long incline before her, spreading blacker fingers through the black valley. She tries to pick out the huge building in the centre of the town that used to be the abbey’s church, but even its high square tower stands lower than the hill beyond, and it evades her eye. Within minutes, they arrive at the town gate, where Sir Thomas is known, and they pass through without delay. As the streets take form, their pace increases. Here they can trot, knowing from experience the better condition of the road. They follow Sir Thomas and his man right or left as they wind along streets and through alleys, in a part of the town unfamiliar to Alice. They draw to a halt before a low doorway, of which she can pick out a stone surround, and stout hinges stretching across dark wood. The roof starts just above head height; the gaol is an insignificant one-storey structure, more like a bridewell for petty offenders.

Ursula is urging her mount alongside Sir Thomas. ‘Surely this is not the place?’

Jay jumps down and hammers on the door. They wait, the horses patiently still, or gently side-stepping, hooves clapping on the hard ground.

A light kindles behind a slit in the wall. ‘The keeper’s room,’ Sir Thomas explains. The glow disappears and a few seconds later the sound of a sliding shutter heralds a lantern held high above a whiskered face through a small square gap in the door. A rasping voice demands, ‘What time of night do you call this to be knocking up honest men?’

‘Justice Harcourt,’ Sir Thomas announces, ‘on an urgent matter regarding a prisoner here.’

The voice changes. ‘Step forward, I cannot see you. Ah, yes, and how can I be of service, sir?’

Sir Thomas leans down on a level with the shutter. ‘I am here regarding Wat Meredith, who is held here.’

‘Meredith? You refer to one Meredith held here?’

‘I have proofs of his innocence of the charges against him and I am come to see him released.’

‘One moment, please,’ the man answers, and grunts and closes the shutter, and they are left in darkness once more. Alice screws round, she has no idea of where east is, but the sky remains as it has been all their journey. Surely it is not even midnight, far less anything approaching dawn. And yet, with the weight of purpose they carry, the sight of buildings shadowed dark against a less dark sky brings on a nervousness as to the hour. The sporadic clatter of hooves has her wondering if the others are also looking around for signs of a lightening sky.

She jumps as the shutter in the gaol door is suddenly thrust back and the face reappears. ‘Sir Thomas, you speak of one Meredith?’

‘I do.’

‘The man that was the twice-over felon?’

‘The same.’ There is an edge of impatience in Sir Thomas’ voice. ‘Come, man, information has reached me that exonerates him entirely. I have the papers here.’ He extends his hand to Ursula who passes them to him. He holds them up to the gaoler’s view. ‘No execution can take place.’

‘But, Sir Thomas, Meredith is gone.’

‘Gone? Where?’

‘To be hanged, of course. It is what was ordered.’

‘He cannot be gone!’ Ursula cries. ‘It is nowhere near dawn!’

‘Madam, you have the right of it,’ the gaoler says. ‘It is not yet dawn. Indeed, I would suppose it to be several hours before dawn. Though we have no clock here, you understand. I have sometimes felt that a clock—’

‘Then where is he?’ Sir Thomas breaks in.

‘That I cannot say for sure, sir,’ the gaoler replies. Perhaps it is his advanced age, but the gaoler has a way of speaking slowly and deliberately as though weighing each word before presenting it. ‘But I would suppose he has arrived by now.’

‘Where?’ Sir Thomas demands.

‘It is a distance, of course, but they were bound for Portland Isle. They have a—’

‘Portland?’ Sir Thomas roars. ‘On whose authority?’

‘On the very highest authority sir. At least in this county of Dorsetshire, I would suppose it to be the highest, though it may be that—’

‘Whose orders, man?’

‘Coroner Dallier’s orders, sir.’

‘Why, it was Coroner Dallier who instructed that Meredith be hanged here! It was expressly ordered!’

‘Indeed sir, but Coroner Dallier changed the instructions when he saw the situation here.’

‘What situation?’

‘You see, it’s like this, our hangings are all public here, we have no private gallows. Coroner Dallier laid down that this was to be private.’

‘But why Portland? Why not build a gallows here?’

‘There is no space here sir. This is but a small gaol, hardly larger than a simple lock-up for fellows in drink and bawds and—’

‘Somewhere here in Sherborne, then… what about the old castle?’

‘Coroner Dallier would brook no delay, Sir Thomas,’ the man replies. ‘He insisted on dawn. But as I told him, you cannot build a gallows in a matter of hours, in the dark.’

‘They’ve had all day to do it!’

‘Not on a Sunday, Sir Thomas. You do not ask a man to build a gallows on a Sunday.’

‘Why such a hurry that they could not give him a day’s grace?’ Ursula demands.

‘There was no need, madam. In fact, Coroner Dallier commended me for an excellent solution, for not only does it maintain the spirit of the sentence but also it saves the cost of a gallows.’

‘Oh, dear God!’

‘Why Portland, man?’ Sir Thomas says. ‘There is no prison there.’

‘Indeed, sir, you have the right of it. And it would not make a very good prison now, I suppose, for it has fallen sadly into decay since the days of the Spanish fleet. That was in the days of a full garrison, of course, but there, from all I hear, it now has but few men—’

Sir Thomas interrupts these meanderings. ‘You speak of Portland Castle?’

‘I was just coming to that, Sir Thomas, if you will be patient. There were quantities of piratical invaders in those days, or papists intent on landing – those, that is, who were not sunk by the cannon fire from the castle, nor swept away by the deceitful currents in those parts. You must always watch for the smooth water, you know, for that is the current that will carry a man off, no matter how strong—’

‘What are you talking about, man? What’s so special about Portland Castle?’ Sir Thomas’ voice is edged with exasperation.

‘Well might you wonder, sir. For across Portland Roads is its brother-in-arms at Sandsfoot, and there was little to choose between them—’

‘Sandsfoot is a ruin. I trust you’re not telling me Meredith is at Sandsfoot?’ Sir Thomas demands.

‘It would be naught to the purpose to send a man to Sandsfoot to meet his Maker, sir, for Sandsfoot is as you say a sad ruin, and who then would hang him? In which case he might as well have stayed here and waited for us to build our own gallows.’

‘At last! You’re saying there is a gallows at Portland Castle?’

‘Of course, it is as I keep saying if you would but listen, sir. They would hardly send this Meredith to a place with no—’

‘By Christ’s bones, man!’ Sir Thomas has had enough. ‘Tell me when they left and where they were bound!’

‘Calm yourself, sir,’ the gaoler soothingly advises. ‘I am coming to that, though without a clock I am hard put to say when exactly, but I believe I may safely say…’

‘Mid-morning means with changes they will have reached Portland late afternoon to evening,’ Sir Thomas says to the six ranged around him as they try to fathom what their next step should be.

‘It’s thirty miles,’ his man William says ‘All the way back we’ve already come, and then twice that on to Portland. We’d be hard pressed to do that in a few hours in daylight.’

One of the stable boys says. ‘While we travel seven together we are constantly checking that everyone is with us. Fewer will be faster.’

‘One man could do it,’ Jay says, ‘one man who knows the road. I know it well enough to Dorchester, mistress, then it’s just south from there.’

‘I cannot risk the chance of an accident, of your not getting there, Jay,’ Ursula says. ‘We have only the one set of these papers. More of us must go.’

‘I shall be of that number,’ Sir Thomas says. ‘I say William goes with me.’

‘I too shall go,’ Ursula says. ‘Wat is my man and it is my duty.’

‘Mistress Cazanove, may we speak apart?’ Sir Thomas draws his mount away from the group and Ursula follows. There is a low-voiced conversation, or rather argument, as far as Alice can tell. Its purport is fragmented by the discussion that breaks out among the rest of them.

William says, ‘He’s telling her we must count women out straightway. What if they are injured? One of us will have to stop with them.’

‘If a man is injured, you would leave him at the next dwelling and continue on your way,’ Alice objects. ‘It is the same for a woman.’

The stable boys clearly fear being left behind to look after the women. They argue that the five men should go. And what excuse would they give, Jay asks them, if anything happened to their mistress after they have ridden off? William declares that his skill in night riding is second to none, and he and Sir Thomas can do this between them. The gaoler has come out of his door and he stands, lantern swinging back and forth, lighting first one face then another as he follows the dispute. They are getting nowhere.

Sir Thomas and Ursula continue to debate at a distance, but Alice becomes aware that gradually Sir Thomas’s tones are heard more and for longer, and Ursula’s responses shorten.

At a break in the to and fro, Alice suggests, ‘If just a few go, we can take a string of horses with us and change part-way. That will make us faster and give the best chance of getting to Portland in time.’

William says, ‘With my master and me, we need take only two extra horses and that leaves three for the rest of you to get home.’

‘You run ahead,’ Ursula tells him, rejoining the group. ‘We have not yet decided who shall go to Portland. Sir Thomas and I have conferred and come to an agreement. You will not all like it,’ she adds, preparing them for what she is about to say. ‘Sir Thomas and I have agreed that two is sufficient. Two will be the fastest.’

‘Which two?’ Alice and Jay chorus.

‘We have also debated as to who among us should be eligible. Mistress Jerrard and Master Harker, I regret we must exclude you. You two have ridden long these past days.’

‘But—’ Alice wants to say that it was she and Jay who brought back the evidence of Wat’s innocence, without which this ride would not be happening. But Sir Thomas does not know that, and Ursula’s suggestion that her own enquiries unearthed the truth carries more weight. The lantern light falling slantwise on Jay’s face throws sharp shadows across his angry frown. ‘I can ride as well as any,’ he objects.

Ursula says, ‘This is a task for those who are fresh. Alertness and speed are of the essence here. No, I have decided, Jay,’ she insists, as Jay goes to object again. ‘Sir Thomas shall be one rider, and we shall select the other impartially from the remaining four of us.’ Jay pulls his horse round and away from the group, and Alice feels for his disappointment, the keener as Wat is his friend.

‘Short straw,’ Sir Thomas says. ‘We are agreed, Mistress Cazanove?’

‘Agreed.’ She calls to one of the stable boys. ‘That looks like a strip of garden over the road there. Do you find some straws or stalks that we can use.’

Borrowing the gaoler’s lantern, the boy goes off to pick, while Sir Thomas and William confer quietly together and the rest wait in silence. Far in the distance lightning flickers in the clouds. On receiving a bunch of stalks, Sir Thomas holds one up to show them he is breaking it off short. He turns his back to arrange them in his hand, before offering them round. Muted thunder rolls across the skies as Ursula draws long. One of the stable boys looks chagrined at his straw, and the other groans with disgust. Sir Thomas’s man William does not even bother to take the last straw; he gives a whoop of delight.