CHAPTER XXII.

_FATAL SEDGEMOOR._

Was I alive or dead, sleeping or waking? Was all this tumult part of a horrid dream? or was I in the midst of unknown and undreamed of horrors? With a sense of strange suffocation I strove to rise, but was unable to do so. I was lying in a dry ditch, and Blackbird was on the top of me, not crushing me by his weight, but so placed that I could not do more than lift my head and look about me.

Day had broken, the long low shafts of light fell across the plain, and I saw, as in a dream, the figures of men in hot pursuit one of another. I saw men smitten down by their fellows, falling sometimes without a groan, sometimes with shrieks of agony. I saw worse things than that too; for even as I lay and watched, scarce knowing who I was nor where I had got, nor what this fearful sight could mean, I saw fierce-faced men with bloody swords striding amongst ghastly heaps of writhing human forms, and dealing awful blows here and there with remorseless fury, sometimes even laughing at the suppliant cries and groans of the wounded wretches, but only driving home more fiercely their gory blades, with a brutal oath or the exclamation, "There goes another traitor!"

As I watched with that awful fascination which a scene of horror always inspires, shivering and shuddering lest my own turn should come next, sense and memory returned to me. I remembered the events of the previous night--the strange dark march to Sedgemoor, the attack in the dead of night, the rout, the fierce irresponsible onset that I had made, and the roar of battle which had been in my ears when I was smitten down, I knew not when nor how.

But now the battle was over. Now there was nothing but an awful carnage that was not warfare but a shambles. And I lay and watched it, and tried to pray to God to spare me, or to give me courage to die; and I kept asking in my heart how the battle had gone, though I knew all too well by the sights I saw.

For they were not our men who were marching to and fro upon the bloody field, slaying without pity all whom they could find. They wore the dress of the regular army; they had the mien and air of practised soldiers. They challenged one another in the name of the King, and they shouted, "Down with all rebels! down with Scott's vagabonds!" as they sent poor half-armed, wounded rustics to their last account.

I verily believed that Blackbird saved my life that day; I will say how anon. As I lay in the ditch, wondering whether he too were dead, and whether I should ever be able to rise and stand on my feet again, or whether I should be despatched by the sword-thrust of one of these bloody men, a groan close at hand told me that I was not alone, and I spoke low, asking who was there.

"A wounded soldier," was the answer. "I thought that all were dead here in this ditch save me. Art thou from Monmouth's following?"

"I came to see the battle. I am no soldier, but only a lad untrained to arms. Who art thou? And how came the battle to be lost? Surely we outnumbered the foe; and we took them unawares in the darkness."

"It was those accursed horsemen," groaned my unseen companion, who lay behind me in the ditch. "We always said that my Lord Grey would ruin any cause. Had the horse but stood their ground even without striking a blow, we would have won the battle without them. Curse upon those cowards who taught them to flee! A plague upon Lord Grey and his poltroons!"

"What did he do? what did he do?" I asked, in great excitement and indignation.

"Do? why, fled like a coward after the first charge; and though we of the infantry came up rank after rank and fired for hours, and would have stood firm and won the battle for the Duke yet if we had had ammunition, those cursed horsemen charged back into the rear and cried that all was lost; so the waggons made off, and the rear ranks took fright, and all fled helter-skelter as they could. As for us, we stood firm, and fired all our ammunition; and when all was done, and no waggons came up, and we kept calling, 'Ammunition, ammunition! for the Lord's sake ammunition!' and none was brought us, we had to lay aside our muskets and take our pikes. And when at last the enemy's horse formed and charged, we were broken to pieces, and fled; and they came and cut us down like sheep. A curse upon those horsemen who lost us the battle!"

The poor fellow did not speak all this in one breath as I have written it down, but in gasps and disjointed fragments; and I found he had heard a part from other fugitives, who had fled with him, but had become confused, as he was himself in the darkness, and had lost themselves upon the moor, wounded and faint, and had been struck down by the weapons of the pursuing soldiers.

"Where is the Duke?" I asked; and the answer came with another groan,--

"Fled--fled with my Lord Grey, long before we had ceased firing, and when we would have won him the battle yet if the horse had returned and the waggons come up. Ah me! ah me! it is not hard to die in a good cause; but it is hard to be deserted by those who should be our leaders and commanders when the battle is still being fought."

It was very terrible to lie there and hear all this, and picture that gallant stand of the untrained foot on the edge of the rhine; and to know that whilst they were firing, firing, firing, and throwing death and confusion into the enemy's ranks, they had been deserted by the Duke, and left to their fate by the cavalry and the rest of the army. I could well understand that it might not be all the fault of my Lord Grey, that the untrained horses might soon become unmanageable in the darkness and the tumult, and that a rout was due more to that than to the cowardice of their riders; but still they need not have communicated panic to the rear of the army. They should have encouraged and not discouraged the fellows behind. But what boots it to muse or to speak thus? The battle was lost; the Duke was fled; and now what lay before those who had embraced his cause?

I was soon to see something of that all too near. Steps were heard approaching, and a brutal laugh sounded so close above my head that I shut my eyes and set my teeth, believing verily that my last hour had come.

"Here is another of them," cried a voice. "A militiaman too--a deserter to the rebels! Let us take him to the Earl to be hanged, as an example to all loyal folks."

"Get up, you hound!" cried another voice; and I heard the sound of a blow or kick, followed by a groan from the voice of the man who had talked to me.

"I cannot," he said faintly; "I am sore wounded. Have mercy, sirs."

"Mercy for a rebel cur! You and your fellows will soon see what the mercy of the gracious King is like. Get up, you hound!"

Another blow, another groan, and then the first voice said,--

"Never mind him; he's not worth the trouble. Kill him, and come away."

The next moment a sickening sound reached my ears, as a sword was buried in the unhappy man's body, and he expired with a gurgling groan.

A cold sweat broke out over me. My head fell back, and my eyes closed. I felt the horse above move slightly, and his head seemed to come down upon mine. For a moment I thought I should be suffocated, and almost cried aloud; but fear held me mute, and almost at once the steps passed on. Then I felt another movement of Blackbird's, and presently his whole body moved, there was a struggle and a quiver, and he rose and stood upon his feet, looking down at me, and touching my face with his velvet nose, caressing me in his silent fashion, as though he would ask how I fared.

I had thought him dead all this while. But he was only exhausted, and I verily believe some instinct of self-preservation and the preservation of his master had kept him perfectly still and quiet all this while; for it was not till the field at this part was deserted of soldiers that he rose to his feet. And when I struggled upon mine I was alone with the dead, and nothing but the reddened earth and heaps of slain to say how the conflict had sped.

I felt all my limbs, but found none of them broken. I had a wound on both sides of my arm, where a ball had passed through it; and the effusion of blood must have made me faint, and then have stopped. I bound the wound with a kerchief and slipped it under my sleeve, that I might not look like a wounded man. I washed my face and hands in a ditch, and rearranged my disordered habiliments. My plain leather doublet and gaiters did not tell tales, and Blackbird's glossy coat was soon restored to order by a little careful grooming. I had lost my cap; but there were many lying about the field, and I found a plain one suited to my appearance, and put it on, with a shudder as I thought that its owner was probably lying cold in the sleep of death.

Having done all this, I mounted Blackbird, and began to pick my way across the plain in the direction that I saw by the sun must lead me back to Bridgewater. I knew that I was liable to be caught and slain at any moment if I met a party of soldiers who suspected me; but I was too dazed with horrors to feel anything but a sort of numb desire to save myself if possible. If I did perish, I did perish. There was certainly nothing else to be done than to try to get back home.

As I picked my way across the plain, Blackbird snorting and turning aside again and again from heaps of corpses, I suddenly became aware of a strange sight. Across the plain in front of me there came at lightning speed a wild young horse galloping madly. A rope was round his neck, and the other end of the rope was tied round the neck of a fine-looking young man, who was stripped of almost all his clothing. And fast as the horse ran, the man kept pace with him step for step; till just as they reached one of the great rhines of which I have spoken, the horse tripped, and fell exhausted, and the man upon him.

Behind came a number of horsemen, galloping as hard as they could, with much shouting and laughing. Curiosity got the better of prudence, and I rode up and asked what was going on.

"Marry, it is the Earl's sport," cried the fellow I had addressed. "Yon man was to purchase his life by running with the horse. It was told my lord that he could run with any steed, and he was promised his life if he proved it true. Verily it was a brave run. The horse fell before the man. He has earned his ransom well. Why are they bringing him back?"

For the runner had been taken by two troopers, and, panting and exhausted, was being led back in the direction in which all were now moving.

"Where take they him now?" I asked, looking with curiosity and awe into the face of a gallant-looking soldier, whose arms and accoutrements and mien pronounced him to be a leader and general.

"To the camp at Weston, I suppose," answered my informant. "We are about to hang a batch of rebels. Thou hadst better come and see the fun, boy. There will be rare times for the country now! First they will have military vengeance from my lord the Earl of Feversham, him yonder with the stern brow and eagle eyes, and from Colonel Kirke and his Lambs, of whom doubtless thou hast heard; and when these have done their part, the Lord Chief-Justice Jeffreys will come down and do his office. And a rare time you good rebel folks will have when he comes. Ho! ho! ho!"

The laugh which followed made my blood run cold; but I dared not refuse to follow the band, lest I should draw suspicion upon myself. It did not appear that anybody so far had troubled to waste a thought upon me. My youth and my hunched back preserved me from suspicion.

The camp at Weston Zoyland presented a strange and animated appearance. Already the news of the defeat and flight of the Duke had reached far and wide, and farmers and gentlemen anxious to propitiate the victors had come crowding out with hogsheads of beer and wine and provisions of all sorts for the soldiers, together with loyal expressions of good-will, and every appearance of delight at the termination of the ill-starred rebellion. Mirth, revelry, and cruelty were reigning rampant; and there were nigh upon a score of trembling prisoners only waiting the word of the Earl to be hanged upon the great oak tree, still known as the Bussex Oak, and called by the peasants "Hangman's Oak."

"String him up with the rest!" cried Lord Feversham, pointing to the man who had won his race, and whose life had been promised to him as the reward; and in spite of his pleading and remonstrance he was dragged off to the tree with the rest. A great fellow with a horrid-looking knife came forward from the group of soldiers, and I knew that his office was to dismember the miserable wretches, probably before they were quite dead, that their heads and quarters might be nailed up in high places, a terror and a warning to others.

But I could not stay to see it done. A sickening horror possessed me. I turned Blackbird's head, and dug my heels into his sides; and unnoticed in the crowd and in the midst of so much revelry and excitement, I galloped off along the near road into Bridgewater, which I reached faint and exhausted some time not long after noon on Tuesday morning.

What a changed place it was from the one I had quitted on the Sunday evening! Then all had been hope and brightness and enthusiasm; now a look of blank terror was seen stamped upon all faces. The people went about as if afraid each man to look at his neighbour; and in many houses the shutters were shut and the windows all shrouded, because the families had fled from the expected vengeance, and were striving to put the sea between themselves and their remorseless enemies.

In the market-place there were still drawn up some bodies of troops, which had fled there with the horsemen on hearing that the Duke had taken flight and deserted his army. Colonel Hucker was there with his troop, and I sometimes think that even then if the Duke had but remained, something might yet have been done to retrieve the fortunes of the day.

It has been reported of Colonel Hucker that he betrayed the cause of the Duke on Sedgemoor, first by firing the pistol which gave the alarm to the foe, and then by flying with his men before defeat had become a fact; but those who thus speak do him an injustice, for he never sought to save himself. It is true that had Taunton been fortified he would have been made governor, and he was anxious that this should be done; but his disappointment on that score never made him disloyal to the cause, as was proved by the fact that he sealed it with his blood, when he had ample opportunity to make good his escape had he been so minded.

The news which I brought of the hangings and massacres on Sedgemoor added to the terror and despair of the people. The bands of soldiers melted away, the poor wretches fearing for their lives, as well they might; and Bridgewater was left defenceless to the fury of the avenger.

All that day, men were at work all along the road betwixt Weston and the city, erecting a row of ghastly gibbets; and before two days had passed, every one of these gibbets bore a horrid burden of human forms--some hung in chains, to remain there for months and years, the last being not removed until the landing of William of Orange.

I think that when I brought the evil tidings to Mistress Mary and my lord, I gave her a blow from which she found it hard to recover. I well remember the white face and wild eyes she turned towards me, and the way in which she wrung her slim white hands together, looking first at me and then at my lord, as she cried out,--

"I brought him into this--and the cause is lost! God has not been on our side. And perhaps he will even have to die for it. And the fault is mine! the fault is mine!"

Then she put her hands before her face, and we saw the tears forcing themselves through her fingers; and my lord rose up on his elbow and said,--

"Mary, sweetheart, come hither to me!"

She came weeping, and kneeling down beside his bed she prayed,--

"Reginald, canst thou forgive me?"

"Nay, I have nothing to forgive, sweetheart. And, dearest, if the cause be good, it is none the less so for being unfortunate. If I have taken up arms for liberty and right, and God sees not fit to crown those efforts of ours with victory, it is not that the cause is not rightful, nor that He will desert the right, but that His time is not yet, or that He has other means in store by which to work. Be not faint-hearted, be not cast down. All this has drawn us but close and closer to one another. I would not have it otherwise; and thou dost know well, sweetheart, that I was never very sure of present victory. I did not enter the cause with blinded eyes; and if I have to lay down my life, as many will, I shall die happy in knowing that thy love has been mine, and that thou wilt be loving me and praying for me to the last."

"Ah, Reginald, talk not so! I cannot bear it, I cannot bear it! Thou shalt not die--thou must not die! it will break my heart!"

"Mistress Mary," I cried suddenly, "methinks indeed that my lord shall not die. Let him but rest here in secret, none knowing where he is, till he be able to take horse again, and I will convey him to a safe asylum, where he may lie hid until the hue and cry be past." And then I told them of the secret chamber in my aunt's house, and how she had promised to hide my lord there if ever he should need a safe hiding-place from his foes.

Mistress Mary's face lightened and brightened as she listened, and my lord smiled too, and gave me a look which reminded me of the charge he had given me to care for Mistress Mary likewise should peril threaten her.

None knew in the days that must follow who would escape and who would suffer. I might be in no small peril myself, for I had been with the Duke's army again and again; and though I think that none knew how I had borne arms in that last battle and had charged so madly into the enemy's ranks, yet I knew not that I might not be accused of other crimes, and have to suffer for my love and loyalty in the cause of the Duke. My youth and hunched back had many times saved me from suspicion, but it might well cause me to be known and noticed where others would escape. As I thought of these things I trembled for myself; but in times of common danger it is strange how quickly one forgets the pressure of fear and personal peril. One grows used to it and ceases to think of it; and indeed we had too much to think of in the days which followed, too much of present horror to see, to have thought to spare for possible horrors to come.

"Colonel Kirke is coming! Colonel Kirke is coming! He and his Lambs are on their way!" cried the terrified towns-people on that well-remembered Tuesday afternoon, and they all fled to their houses, as though afraid to look upon the face of the conqueror, although they could not but crowd to the windows to see him and his soldiers bringing in waggon-loads of prisoners and miserable wounded wretches, who were to be hanged and quartered at leisure.

And I must not here omit to mention the noble and godly labours of our good Bishop Ken, the Bishop of Bath and Wells, who came amongst us at this time, and himself went amongst the prisoners, the sick, and the wounded, striving to prepare them for their fate, and doing all that man can do both to ease their condition in their prisons, and to win from the stern military tyrant grace and pardon for numbers who would otherwise have perished. Nor were his labours in vain, for he gained pardon and freedom for many; and many others were brought to peace and repentance before they met their end, so that they were able to lay down their lives cheerfully and with a good courage.

But to return to my story and Mistress Mary, of whom I must now write. I stood with her at an upper window of the inn to see the soldiers enter, and as evil fate would have it, there amongst them, riding not far behind Colonel Kirke, was the Rev. Nicholas Blewer; and it so chanced that his evil eyes, roving restlessly about as they were wont to do, glanced upward in passing at our window, and fixed themselves upon the face of Mistress Mary.

She did not see him, and resisted when I would have pulled her back, so that he saw her plainly; and I saw an evil light flash into his eyes, and knew that some plan had instantly formed itself in his cunning brain against my sweet mistress.

Making a hurried excuse to leave the room, I went straight to my lord and Miss Blake, who were together in his sick-chamber, the elder lady having altogether refused to see the sight of the enemy's entrance into the town. To them I told what I had seen, and at once both declared that Mary must at once leave Bridgewater and return to her home in Taunton.

Amidst her own towns-people, where the name of her guardian, Lord Lonsdale, was known and respected, she would be as safe as any person could be at such a time; but here in Bridgewater, with an army fresh from plunder and slaughter close at hand, in a public-house where entrance could be denied to none, and where nobody knew or had any care for her, she was not safe for a day. She must therefore depart instantly, before Mr. Blewer would believe it possible to accomplish the flight, and never rest till she was safe beneath the roof of Miss Blake's house, which the citizens of Taunton would not permit to be invaded without due and sufficient reason. Mr. Blewer had no friends in that city. He would not be able to effect there (where he was known and distrusted) what he might be able to in this place.

"And, Dicon," said my lord, when Miss Blake had gone to make instant preparation for departure, "come not back to Bridgewater; but remain at Taunton, watching over Mistress Mary--"

"But, my lord, you need my care and tendance."

"I can do without it if needs be, good Dicon. I have been thinking I would rather thou wert otherwise occupied than with me since the defeat on Sedgemoor has put my head in peril." Then as I was about to protest, he silenced me with one of those movements of his hand which I knew so well, and continued, speaking quietly: "Go to Taunton, and remain there. I am for the present safe; and more than that none can say for himself. I can pay for the tendance thou hast hitherto given me. And thou must be beside Mistress Mary, to see if any peril threaten her, and convey her away if it do to that cottage where her friend and companion will hide her till the storm be past. Wert thou here I should fret myself into a fever thinking her being carried off by yon miscreant; but if thou art close at hand and on the watch, I shall feel that she has a protector."

I could say no more. Indeed I so loved both my lord and Mistress Mary that I knew not which stood first in my heart, albeit it was to the service of my lord that I was pledged. But if he dismissed me on any mission, it was but for me to obey; and forthwith I went down to the stables to prepare the horses, and before half an hour had passed we were riding forth together, Miss Blake and Mistress Mary wearing their riding-hoods drawn deeply over their faces, and I riding just behind them, as though I were their servant--as indeed I was.

All the town had gathered to see the entry of the soldiers--all the people, that is, who dared to leave their houses; people of the poorer sort, to whom a show was a show, be the cause never so evil.

The streets were almost deserted as we rode through them, and Mistress Mary's head was bent low. She was weeping to herself, as I well knew, thinking, doubtless, of her joyful entry into the town a few days before, full of hope for the cause, and happy in thinking of seeing my lord again, even though he lay sorely wounded.

Now she had bidden him adieu. She was parted from him, and in such a time as this none dared to say when and how they would meet again. He was in sore peril, and she in something of danger herself, though I know not if she guessed it. He might well be arraigned for treason, being found in arms against his sovereign. She was the object of vengeful love of a bad man, who would seek to win her by foul means, and having possession of her and her fortune, proceed to break her heart by his cruelty. In sooth, I scarce knew whose peril was the greater; and right glad was I to reach the shelter of Taunton Town with my fair charge, having seen and heard nothing of pursuit, and having plainly given the slip to the cunning Nicholas left behind in Bridgewater.