The Grove of Eagles by Winston Graham
I said nothing then, but about midday had to cry off the search for food and let the others go on alone. They were lucky and came back with a tiny hen. This, cooked and eaten with the fingers, was the first fresh meat we had tasted since capture, but I could not savour it. They looked at me sympathetically and I tried to make light of the trouble. We started off again at dusk, and I travelled until the first streaks of dawn were in the sky. Then I had to give up and lie writhing in the dust.
That I should be attacked at this stage with the dysentery we alone had avoided seemed the harshest turn of fate. It made nonsense of any hope of escape. I knew from watching others that this was only the beginning of an attack. It would get worse until I was prostrate and perhaps unconscious. In five or six days I would die or get better. But five or six days was too long to survive under present conditions.
We moved on again for two hours before the heat was great and then took refuge in a coppice on the north side of a ridge. We had found no water yesterday and the mules badly needed it. The problem of water in this barren land was that such springs as might exist were likely to be the sites of hamlets or villages. We would not probably find another river-bed.
I tried to persuade George and Crocker to leave me and go on. This was the clear and logical thing to do. They would not, as I think I should not have. It is when human beings are above human logic that they perhaps show their affinity with God.
They made me a rough shelter from the fierce rays of the sun, put the last of their water beside me, and then split, Crocker to go towards the sea and Major George inland. Whether they found food or not they were to meet here again at dusk.
Sometimes an illness can just consciously be kept at bay while there are others about and while there are decisions to be taken. When the others are gone and the decisions made there is no barrier left. So within an hour I was in a high fever, my belly dissolved into pain and blood.
I thought I was back at Arwenack at the great hall, but it was no pleasant home-coming. A huge log fire was blazing and one could not get away from the heat. All about the room were Dominican monks in the long black robes of the Inquisition. They were staring at the fire and at the pile of logs waiting to be burned in the hearth. Suddenly the one next to me threw back the hood and cloak showing the white woollen garment underneath. It was Katherine Footmarker. She smiled at me, and her teeth had been filed down to points; her eyes held little blazing fires of their own.
‘Well, Maugan,’ she said, ‘so you are back. Now that this is a Catholic country you must conform or die.’ ‘The Spanish have conquered?’ I asked. ‘Oh, yes. They are dragging the women through the streets by the hair.’ ‘But where is my family? Where are the Killigrews?’ ‘They would not conform, Maugan, so they are in there, in there, in there, where all heretics go …’
I looked across at the fire and saw that at the back of it was a heap of skulls and that the logs in the hearth were in fact a pile of dismembered human limbs. I struggled to get towards them in the hope that I might yet save one of them but was held back by the monks, who came to cluster around me, chattering in Spanish and other alien tongues. I shouted and screamed and swore but nothing availed. Then one of the monks came across with a piece of the fire and thrust it into my belly.
The old woman who found me fetched her friends but would not let them cut my throat; instead she had me carried to her hut and laid on her own straw pallet. She disregarded warnings that I had the plague and washed me and dressed the festering sore in my side. Then she squatted down to wait for me either to recover or to die.
It was perhaps forty-eight hours before I began to disentangle her round cautious inquiring face from the faces of fever and delusion. By then she was feeding me on lentil soup which she put into my mouth with a thick wooden ladle. Slowly the phantoms returned less often and I knew where I was and that the disease was on the wane.
The hut we were in was on a hill slope a little removed from me hamlet below. It appeared to be partly built into the rock of the hill, for the roof was of natural stone. On it for a long time I watched a spider in a strange semi-warfare with a colony of ants. And I watched the flies—scavengers rubbing their legs and heads, buzzing around the other insects, privileged by the dimension of flight. Sometimes a lazy bee would bump against the wall, lost and clumsy.
For a long time I lay in this way, gaining slowly in strength but thinking very little, content in utter weakness to let the time drift by, watching day come to the window of the hut, blaze and fade and grow dark again. The woman, whose name was Carla, would come and go during the day, working in the old olive grove beside the hut which provided her with subsistence. Once a day, it seemed, she went down to the hamlet for water; sometimes in the evening curious neighbours would come to peer and question, but she drove them away.
She had grey hair tied tight back under a black cloth scarf, and cheeks like an onion, the skin high-coloured and loose; black eyes deep-set and changeless. At first we could understand nothing of each other—her country Portuguese was too much for me, but after a time we began to understand words and simple phrases.
One day I was able to sit up, the next to move to the door of the hut and stare out. I could only speculate on what might have happened to George and Crocker. Thoughts of my own predicament came nearer to disturb and frighten. Although there might be little direct communication between these peasants and the Spanish, some rumour would be likely to reach them sooner or later. It was not as if we had merely escaped. The sooner I was on my way the better. But where would that way be? The mules had disappeared. The few precious stones I had left had also gone; I only hoped Carla had them. The best one could look for now was some quiet hamlet such as this where one could gradually pick up strength and the protective clothes and manners of the countryside. But much, much farther from Lagos.
While I was so ill I had slept on Carla’s pallet and she on the floor. I wanted to change this round but she would have none of it. With an ancient smile she indicated that I was her guest and so must have the place of honour.
She had never asked me who I was, how I had come to be alone and sick under a canopy of thin sacking in a cleft on a bare hillside. I had nothing about me to help her guess my nationality or business, but she seemed incurious. I was somebody who had come into her life and she had cared for me as she would have a sick animal.
I told her that I must be off soon; I could not trespass on her any longer; but she shook her head emphatically; I was not yet well enough, another week perhaps, there was no hurry. I questioned her about the countryside around. We were, she said, about two days by mule from Faro. She had never been that far, but she had heard it had recently been burned by the English and life was not resumed there yet. Much farther east, perhaps three more days, was a big river which divided Portugal from Spain. Between was country such as this, she thought; her nephew had once told her so.
About this time the weather at last broke; a dawn brought ink-blue skies and then thunder. Rain fell all day drumming like a military attack on roof and trees and cracked earth. The hillside changed into rivulets of yellow mud; dust-dry walls within the hut began to sweat, the olive trees bent under the weight. Then the storm cleared away and the following day was blue and sparkling. For the first time I felt a return of full vigour, and was ready to be off.
I asked Carla if she could find me any sort of peasant’s cloak and rough breeches, and she said she would try. A skin of water, a belt with some food, a pair of shoes, a stout stick and a knife; it was as much as one could expect, and more. I tried to thank her for what she had done, but she only grinned politely and shrugged it off. I said I wanted to leave on the following day, but she said there were signs against it. The new moon would be a better time, and that would be in two days.
The day before I was due to leave I spent out of doors, chopping and sawing wood for her and stacking it for the winter. From this hut you could see the hamlet just below and then across the shallow valley to the hillsid
Tonight I was at the door when I saw five men on horseback coming down the pewter-coloured track on the opposite hill. I at once called Carla, who came and peered, but then said there was no cause for alarm; sometimes men went through this way on journeys west; they seldom visited the hamlet and never her hut. My supper was ready, it would go cold.
So after watching them out of sight round a corner of the hill I squatted beside her and took the soup cup in my hands and sipped it. Twice more I went to the door; the first time they were farther down the valley, the second time they had disappeared.
That day she had brought me an old cloak from the village and had turned out a grey shirt, worn but serviceable. With these I would have to do; I was grateful to her and told her so; she grinned and shrugged and sipped. Night fell and she stirred the wood fire to new cheerfulness.
I said when I left on the morrow, could she spare some bread to take with me, a few olives, water and perhaps a skin of wine? She said she had it all ready.
At the end of supper she muttered her evening prayers. As she was finishing a horse neighed.
I reached for my knife, slid away from the fire and crept on hands and knees to the door. Stars and a still night, two lights winking in the hamlet, a night bird crying. She was beside me, clutching my sleeve. I drew away and out of the hut. Nothing. Then the clink of a hoof.
Shadows and men loomed up. The old woman was in my way. As I raised the knife it was knocked out of my hand. I was dragged into the hut.
An officer, two soldiers and a peasant. As they tied me up the old woman began to talk in a whining tone. Perhaps it would have been better if I had not understood her, for she was arguing with them, saying she had sent her nephew all the way to the Spanish frontier to fetch them, she an old widow woman with no money and scarcely food for her belly. Surely she was entitled to a fair reward?
Chapter Ten
The dungeon at Seville was much different from the one at Lagos. It was solitary and underground and dark. There were three adjoining cells at the end of a long low tunnel, and the grill in mine looked out upon another passage running crosswise at a higher level. The other two cells were unoccupied.
It was very silent. Almost the only sounds were occasional footfalls ringing on the hard stone of the upper passage and the prison bell audible in the high distance.
For a while being alone did not matter. I had plenty to think about, most of it unpleasant, but food enough of a sort for an unquiet mind. The guards would tell me nothing. It is difficult when young to wait patiently for one’s end, but as time went by the mere loneliness became a danger of another sort and almost as much to be dreaded.
I marked off the days with a wooden spoon that was daily brought and daily taken away. I scratched the wall over my bunk. There was no means of knowing the date when this imprisonment began but it seemed important that time in general should be kept track of.
I asked for pen and paper but this was refused. I asked for books or something to make or do. Nothing came. The guards said the commandant of the prison had no instructions. This struck a familiar note. I wondered what fiesta I was being saved for. Yet it seemed certain that there must be some form of trial first. The Spanish strongly believe in the processes of law—even the Inquisition does—and in this case the law was on their side.
To provide some occupation I began to work on a bar of the grill window looking out on the upper passage. I had two rusty nails out of the bunk, which made little impression. But one went on in deference to the spirit of Major George.
Ten scratches became twenty. I tried hard to keep the guards in conversation when they brought food, but nothing would induce them to stay. It seemed likely that they were acting under orders. Stolidly they brought in the dishes of unsavoury mash, stolidly they took them away. The silence of the prison was oppressive. I would have welcomed the shouts of other prisoners. Sometimes I made a noise to reassure myself that I could still hear.
There was a difference between the boots of the guards and the sandal slop of priests. If I ran to the back of the cell it was possible to see the feet passing. Sometimes there would be other footsteps accompanied by the rattle of chains.
Twenty scratches became thirty. Time hung like its own chain about my neck. I recited the Colloquies of Erasmus and such Ovid and Juvenal as I could recollect. I sang and tried to compose new ditties or a poem. But it was hard to remember the lines next day. I tried to recall Victor’s songs:
“My love in her attire doth show her wit,
It doth so well become her.”
and
“Weep not, my wanton, smile upon my knee:
When thou art old there’s grief enough for thee.”
Sometimes I banged at the door demanding to be let out. I wrote letters to people in my head and kept a diary of the capture of Cadiz. The cell, at first stuffy, became cold. The wall on which the days were marked grew damp and water ran down it; I worried that it might wash the scratches away and re-indented them every meal-time.
Thirty scratches became forty, and I reckoned it must be December. I kept free from dysentery but my wound would not heal. Victor’s are healed, I thought; death is the perfect cure; maybe he’s the lucky one.
Little progress with the cell window. Perhaps one had not the dedicated perseverance of George; or it was the knowledge that if I ever got out of the grill it only led to another part of the prison.
One day when the older of the two jailors came to take away the midday meal he dropped a letter on the bunk as he retreated. I snatched it up and stared at it, for it was addressed to me in my father’s writing.
I stared at it for some moments, hands trembling. This could only be some ruse. But how could it profit them? I fingered the letter and turned it round and weighed it in the hand.
“Mastr. Maugan Kyllygrewe, Espana. For delivery.” That was all. I turned it again and the seal fell off.
23rd November, 1596.
“Son Maugan,
Your letter came one week ago this a.m. It is hard news for us that you are a prisoner again. We had already had this word by note from Westminster in August month. The Spanish asked ransom money for the release of all prisoners of birth, and you were named as so captured; so since then we have known you alive.
There is nothing I can do to bring you to a releasement; that is hard but as God’s my judge I could as easy raise the dead as £100 in gold at this moment.
Ruin in its harshest form stares me in the face. By you receive this I am more likely than not to be in Exeter or the Fleet and my ancestor’s home ransacked by savage creditors. This is the reward that comes to me from twenty-odd years attendance at Court, and in the service of the lady our Queen. For the defence of England I have spent money from my own depleted purse, receiving as thanks only calumny and neglect. I have travelled far and laboured much in my country’s interests, but now even my relatives in the Queen’s very bedchamber ignore my pleas for help.
You may by now have expected that an easement of our plight would come by the marriage of young John to Jane Fermor. Well, by evil contrivance it has not. Oh, they were wed as designed on October 8. Sir George came down with a fine band of friends, fifteen in all, a gay, hard-visaged crew all with voices like preachers, in a noisy square. They feasted and drank my last £100, by Christ, they did. Little Jane came with two personal attendants who were to stay here and have stayed—not maids as you’d suppose but men-servants, army veterans, daggers in belts and the rest—as nasty a pair as woman ever dropped. They bore between them a heavy box—the dowry—they could scarcely
Well, the ceremony was done, a part by Merther, a part by Garrock, a part by some lackey cleric they brought themselves: it was all too long drawn for me: I say stand in the church door and dispatch the business quick. Well, it was done and the gay crew deep gone in my drink and the young couple bedded with all manner of lewd jokes, and the night wore on, many now seeing no more than the table legs where they sprawled on the floor. But Sir George, he drinks with the best and takes no heed of it. And I, being mindful of my purpose, take care to take care. So around three of the clock I suggest to him we go to my chamber where the dowry can be counted and checked.
You can have a notion of all I felt, Maugan, that day: the junketing and the shouting and the lewdness and the ran-tan; while all the time my mind was on things particular to my finances. Here at last was the happy outcome. Well, we went off to my chamber, I and Rosewarne and Sir George and that bent-legged attorney of his who had drawn up the settlement; and after a little preamble in came the two soldier-servants carrying the box. And the box was opened, and inside was a small bag of gold, no more large than the bag Belemus carried aboard the Crane.
So I looked into the box and merciful Christ, it was empty of all else, so I said, What was the meaning of this? So Sir George said, It is my daughter’s yearly allowance as agreed in the terms of the marriage settlement. £200 a year I pay her so that she is no burden in your house. So I said, but as to the dowry, where is that? And he said, Oh, but that is not due yet under the terms of the settlement. So I said, Not due? But it was agreed to be paid on marriage. All such dowries are. So he said, Not this one. It is payable when your son comes of age.