The Exiles E-Book und Hörbuch

Vivian Stuart

• E-Book-Herausgeber: Jentas Ehf
  Hörbuch-Herausgeber: Skinnbok
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Serie: The Australians
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Seitenzahl: 431

Beschreibung

VOYAGE TO THE LAST FRONTIER... The first book in the dramatic and intriguing story about the colonisation of Australia: a country built on blood, passion, and dreams. They were transported from 1780s' England, packed like cattle in cargo compartments: scammers and prostitutes, thieves and murderers — doomed to build His Majesty's new colony in Captain Cook's anchorage in Botany Bay. It was a cruel fate even for the toughest of individuals but especially for 15-year-old Jenny Taggart, who was sentenced to lifelong exile for a crime she did not commit. Will there be a future for her in this unknown country, or will she succumb to a rough and brutal life? Rebels and outcasts, they fled halfway across the earth to settle the harsh Australian wastelands. Decades later — ennobled by love and strengthened by tragedy — they had transformed a wilderness into a fertile land. And themselves into The Australians.

Leseprobe

The Exiles

The Australians 1 – The Exiles

© Vivian Stuart, 1979

© eBook in English: Jentas ehf. 2021

Series: The Australians

Title: The Exiles

Title number: 1

ISBN: 978-9979-64-226-8

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition, including this condition, being imposed on the subsequent purchase.

All contracts and agreements regarding the work, editing, and layout are owned by Jentas A/S.

The Australians

The ExilesThe PrisonersThe SettlersThe NewcomersThe TraitorsThe RebelsThe ExplorersThe TravellersThe AdventurersThe WarriorsThe ColonistsThe PioneersThe Gold SeekersThe OpportunistsThe PatriotsThe PartisansThe Empire BuildersThe Road BuildersThe SeafarersThe MarinersThe NationalistsThe LoyalistsThe ImperialistsThe Expansionists

Chapter I

The morning of September 29, 1781, dawned gray and overcast, with tendrils of damp mist swirling over the flat countryside surrounding the small Yorkshire market town of Milton Overblow. But as a watery sun rose to tinge the mist with pale reflected gold, all roads leading to the town soon became crowded with countryfolk in carts, on horseback, or on foot. It was the day of the Michaelmas Fair, traditionally reserved for the sale of horses and sheep, and many in the straggling procession on the road from Overdale drove flocks of sheep before them or had yearling horses tethered to the rear of their carts.

Their progress was, of necessity, slow, but few worried on this account. For the dale’s farmers and smallholders and their families, the Michaelmas Fair was an occasion to which they looked forward from year to year. Clad in their best, their children with scrubbed laces and neatly combed hair, they contained their impatience, aware that the stalls and sideshows and the taprooms in the town would remain open until the last of the influx of visitors had spent his sale money and was compelled reluctantly to depart. The party of horsemen who joined the road from the long tree-lined drive of Overdale Manor, however, was in no mood to brook delay. Led by the owner of the manor, Lord Braxton, on a handsome bay Thoroughbred, they cantered through a flock of sheep, scattering them and two families of walkers into the hedgerows with equal disdain. Only the rector of Overdale, a stout, elderly gentleman on a half-clipped cob, offered a breathless apology to the shepherd as he spurred after his patron, deeming it wise to shut his ears to the fellow’s curses, which were, he knew, directed toward Lord Braxton rather than himself.

His lordship was far from popular either with his tenants or with the local farmers. He had no family ties with the county, for one thing. And for another, both his wealth and his title were of comparatively recent origin – the reward of naval service in the West Indies, where, if rumor were to be believed, he had shown more concern for the acquisition of prize money than for fighting his country’s battles against the French and the American colonists. Nevertheless he had served with sufficient distinction under Admiral Rodney and his second-in-command, Rear Admiral Sir Samuel Hood, to merit the barony which had been conferred on him by a grateful sovereign. And now ... Reverend Simeon Akeroyd gave vent to a sigh as he eased his sweating animal to a pace more suited to its age and sluggish temperament. Now, in retirement, the new Baron Braxton had purchased the lands and Manor of Overdale and had contrived to have himself appointed to the Magistrate’s Bench as chairman.

Had this been all, the dalesfolk would probably have accepted him, the rector thought, as they accepted, with patient resignation, most of life’s other vicissitudes, such as the harsh winters and the poor grazing which, combined with the ever increasing burden of high taxation necessitated by successive wars, came close to beggaring so many of them. The savage sentences Braxton imposed on petty criminals, the fines he exacted for minor breaches of the law – even the arrogance that characterized his dealings with those he considered his social inferiors – would have aroused no more than their unspoken resentment.

But the man was avaricious, and lately, with the aid of his lawyer, Thomas Slater, who was cast in the same mold, he had succeeded in obtaining eviction orders against several of his tenants by invoking the Enclosure Act, with the object of adding their land to his own considerable acreage. Under the act – a Tudor law that had never been rescinded – Lord Braxton demanded certain standards of husbandry that his predecessor, an amiable aristocrat, had not bothered to enforce, and the curtailment of the use of common land for grazing.

And this, patient and accustomed to injustice though they were, the dalesfolk would not suffer in silence. The average smallholder depended on the free use of common land, as had his father before him; sheep could find sustenance on hill and moor, but horses and cows could not. Bitterness against the new lord of the manor was building up to an alarming degree. There had been talk, among a few young hotheads, of paying the tyrant back in his own coin by pulling down the fences he had erected, and some of them had even considered violence against his person. As their spiritual counselor, the old rector had done all in his power to restrain them, warning them of the inevitable consequences of any such action, but most of them had been too angry to pay him heed. Only a week ago two fences on Braxton land had been torn down and the timber stolen under cover of darkness, and there had been a bungled attempt – attributed to footpads – to waylay his lordship’s carriage as it returned late from town.

Fortunately for the culprits, the carriage had been empty and the coachman had met with no harm but ... the Reverend Simeon Akeroyd sighed uneasily. It had been feared that Braxton’s presence at the fair might provoke another futile act of retaliation, which had driven him, reluctantly, to ride over soon after dawn in order to attach himself to the manor party.

Lord Braxton had not welcomed him. He had Lawyer Slater in close attendance, and his rascally bailiff, Ned Waite, in addition to a one-time seaman known locally as “Gunner” O’Keefe, whom he employed as a groom and without whose escort he seldom stirred beyond the confines of his own walled garden. That he was bent on making trouble for some unfortunate seemed evident from his manner and the low-voiced exchanges with Thomas Slater as the small cavalcade formed up on the manor’s graveled carriageway. But, apart from a disparaging remark concerning the ability of the rector’s sorry nag to keep pace with his Thoroughbreds, he had raised no objection to his company, although ... Simeon Akeroyd again buried his spurs in his mount’s hairy sides ... his lordship had made not the smallest effort to suit his speed to that of the poor animal. With relief the rector saw that Lord Braxton’s party had, at last, drawn rein and, urged on by voice and heels, the cob broke into a shambling canter, to come to a halt, breathing heavily, beside the others on the road verge.

His relief was short-lived.

“That’s t’fellow, me lord,” he heard Bailiff Waite say. “That’s t’Scotchman, over yonder. Taggart, he calls himself. ‘Tis he lives by the west side o’ Kirby Stray.”

His pointing finger picked out a farm dray some fifty or sixty yards ahead of them, drawn by two well-matched Clydesdales, their brasses shining in the pale morning sunlight, their manes and tails decked with gaily colored ribbons in preparation for the fair. A man and a woman occupied the driving seat, with a child between them, and three young work horses, with haltered heads – obviously intended for the day’s auction sale – followed behind.

Lord Braxton raised a hand to shade his eyes as he stared in the direction his bailiff had indicated. He asked, over his shoulder, addressing no one in particular, “Does he breed horses, this Taggart?”

The lawyer answered him. “Yes, my lord, so it seems – and he’s said to be good at it. Certainly his animals fetch excellent prices when he puts them up for sale.”

“He feeds ‘em on the stray, me lord,” Ned Waite put in, a hint of malice in his rough voice.

Slater cut him short with a warning glance at the rector.

Kirby Stray marched with the manor boundary to the west; it was prime grazing land, shared by the whole village of Kirby, but, by common consent, during the spring and summer months its use was restricted to grazing by breeding mares and their foals and a few household milk cows. The stray was one of the present bones of contention between Braxton and his tenants. The fences he had recently caused to be set up there, timber posts and all, had vanished into the night.

“You surely do not suppose, my lord,” the rector began, feeling it his duty to intervene on behalf of a respected member of his congregation, “you cannot suppose that Angus Taggart had aught to do with the unfortunate episode of last week?”

“Unfortunate episode you call it, Parson?” Lord Braxton exclaimed wrathfully. He transferred his baleful gaze to the rector’s face, eyeing him with contempt. “Plain theft, that’s what it was – a deliberate flouting of the law! I’ve a perfect right to keep the damned smallholders’ cattle off my grazing land unless they pay me for it, as Slater will confirm. It’s true, isn’t it, Thomas? I’ve title to the grazing?”

“You have indeed, my lord,” Thomas Slater assured him with servile eagerness. “The deeds are all legally approved and filed.” He took a large spotless linen handkerchief from the pocket of his coat and blew his long nose vigorously before embarking on an explanation of the finer legal points. Lord Braxton impatiently waved him to silence.

“Why are you so sure that this fellow – what’s his name? This fellow Taggart hadn’t anything to do with the destruction of my fences, Parson? He had an axe to grind, had he not? Needs grazing for his horses, don’t he? And needs it more than most, damme, seeing he breeds ‘em!”

It was true, Simeon Akeroyd thought sadly. But they all needed Kirby Stray, poor Taggart was not the only one. He knew, with virtual certainty, who had been responsible for the tearing down of the fences, and the burden of his knowledge weighed heavily upon him. An innocent man could not be allowed to suffer for the misdeeds of others, yet ... his eyes fell before the angry challenge of his patron’s. Part of his stipend came from the manor tithes, he reminded himself wretchedly. It would behoove him to choose his words with care, lest they give offense for, heaven knew, his stipend was small enough.

He managed, stammering a little in his anxiety, “Angus Taggart is a decent, law-abiding man, my lord. He’s not the sort of man who – well, who would stoop to clandestine law breaking. He’d not go behind your lordship’s back. If he felt he had a legitimate grievance, I’m sure he would come out with it openly, my lord. Like all Scotsmen, he’s proud and a mite stubborn, perhaps, but –”

“We’ll see how proud he is,” Braxton retorted with emphasis, “when he’s faced with his accuser. Eh, Waite?” He glanced expectantly at his bailiff, who frowned as if the question had taken him by surprise and then nodded vigorously.

“Aye, me lord. ‘Twas him I saw right enough. I’d take me oath on’t.”

“Then after him, man!” his employer ordered. “Tell him to pull off the road so that I can have a word with him.”

“Have a care, my lord,” Lawyer Slater murmured uneasily. “It won’t do to antagonize the fellow until we have positive proof that he was involved.”

“Oh, very well,” Lord Braxton acknowledged. “You heard what Mister Slater said, Waite. No threats, understand – and mind your manners. Just tell Taggart I want to speak to him.”

“Very good, your lordship.” Ned Waite gathered up his reins and trotted after the slowly moving wagon, careful – now that he was alone – to give a wide berth to a second flock of scrawny moorland sheep, which had spread itself across the narrow road. He even touched his cap to Taggart’s pretty young wife when he drew abreast of the dray, the rector observed, and must have made his master’s request civilly enough for, in response to it, Angus Taggart maneuvered his horses on to the road verge and pulled up. Handing the reins to his wife, he alighted and strode back to meet the oncoming horsemen, only pausing to lift a bleating ewe from his path.

He was a tall, solidly built man in his mid-thirties, with a dark, weatherbeaten face and a pair of friendly blue eyes. Dressed in brown homespun jacket and breeches, he wore his red hair tied in a neat queue, military style but unpowdered, and he made an oddly dignified figure as he halted to await Lord Braxton’s approach. Ned Waite, who had prudently remained by the dray on the pretense of securing the horses, obeyed an imperious wave from his employer and returned, with obvious reluctance, on foot, dragging his own mount behind him through the milling sheep.

“You wish to speak with me, my lord?” Taggart inquired. His voice had a faint lilt to it, betraying his Highland ancestry and he spoke quietly, without aggression, as a man with a clear conscience and nothing to fear from what was evidently an unexpected summons. Recognizing the old rector, he smiled and gave him a polite greeting, which the rector returned.

“Your name is Taggart, is it not?” Lord Braxton intervened harshly.

“Aye, it is. Angus Taggart of Long Wrekin, by Kirby. I am one of your lordship’s tenants.”

“Of that I am well aware ... and of the fact that you breed horses, which you have had the effrontery to graze on my land. Is that not true, man?”

Angus Taggart stared at his questioner, his blue eyes first alarmed and then wary. “I graze my animals on the stray, sir, which is common land.” He started to explain, quoting a local bylaw concerning grazing rights, but Lord Braxton would not let him finish.

“Tell this infernal fellow what my rights are, Slater. Tell him that unless grazing land is properly enclosed by fences – double fences, with a hawthorn hedge planted between ‘em – by the date set by the commissioners, then all rights are forfeited.”

Lawyer Slater, who was one of the Land Commission’s solicitors, endeavored to obey him, but again Lord Braxton interrupted, his tone impatient.

“Oh, have done, Mister Slater, have done! He understands well enough, don’t you, my man?”

“No, my lord, I do not,” Taggart confessed. He looked acutely unhappy but he held his ground.

“Damme, you understand that I have done all that the law requires of me, surely? I have set up fences and had them uprooted in the night by cowardly scoundrels, afraid to show their faces in daylight like honest men. You know about that, I’ll warrant!”

“Aye, my lord, I am knowing that it was done. But folk are in desperate need of that grazing – it will spell ruin for them if ‘tis forbidden to them next spring.”

“And it would also spell ruin for you, would it not?” Lord Braxton suggested. “Come now, Taggart – the truth!”

“Indeed it would,” Taggart admitted, without hesitation. “My holding is marsh and moorland for the most part. I have just enough under the plow to feed my stock in winter, and for my neighbors it is the same. Whereas for your lordship –” He thought better of what he had been about to say and left the sentence uncompleted, gesturing instead to the three young horses tethered to the back of his dray. “I cannot winter those, my lord, and they are the best I have. That is why I am taking them to sell at the fair.”

Lord Braxton was smiling, his purpose achieved.

“He is condemned out of his own mouth, don’t you agree, Mister Slater?” Ignoring the lawyer’s warning headshake, he turned again to Angus Taggart. “My fellow Waite tells me that you were responsible for tearing down my fences, Taggart. That’s so, isn’t it, Waite?”

Thus appealed to, the bailiff inclined his close-cropped head. “Aye, me lord, me and O’Keefe.” He exchanged a meaning glance with the ex-seaman, who bared his toothless gums in a wide grin of assent. “Sure, we seen him, your lordship, plain as could be. Diggin’ up the fence posts, so he was, and loadin’ ‘em in his cart.”

Taggart rounded on them, appalled. “You could not have seen me – I was not there! You’re lying, Gunner – you know I had no hand in it.” Despairingly, he appealed to the rector. “Mister Akeroyd, sir, will you not speak up for me?”

The old parson did his best, repeating the assessment of Angus Taggart’s character that he had already supplied, but it was plain that Lord Braxton had no ears for him, and he lapsed into impotent silence as Waite, warming to his task, launched into a series of accusations. That these were unsubstantiated, save by the grinning O’Keefe, began at last to dawn on Taggart, and he said firmly, interrupting the bailiff’s flow, “They offer no proof, my lord – it is their word against mine. And I swear to you that I had no knowledge of this affair until it was over and clone. Indeed I spoke against it when the idea was first mooted and –” He broke off, realizing too late that he had revealed more than he had intended.

“Then you know the culprits?” Braxton suggested coldly.

“Not with certainty, my lord. Indeed, I –”

“You would be well advised to name them, Mister Taggart,” Thomas Slater put in. “That is if you expect his lordship to believe that you had no hand in the affair.”

“I cannot name them, sir,” Taggart answered, tight lipped.

“Cannot... or will not, man?” Lord Braxton challenged.

“Then will not, if it pleases you,” the Scotsman said defiantly. Slow to anger, his temper was at last aroused, and he added, with heat, “I am wishing I had been with them now. They had a right to do what they did – oh, not a legal right, perhaps, but before God, a moral one, with their livelihood at stake. Take that grazing from us, Lord Braxton, and we shall not be able to pay your rents, any of us.” Once again, belatedly, he sensed that he had allowed his tongue to run away with him and fell silent. Braxton seized eagerly on his last admission.

“You may cease paying my rent now, Taggart. Give him formal notice, Mister Slater. I want him off my land within seven days – is that clear?”

“He is entitled to a quarter’s notice,” the lawyer demurred. “In writing, my lord.”

“Then see that he gets it, damn your eyes!” Braxton ordered. He was about to turn away when Angus Taggart, pale but determined, laid a hand on his horse’s rein.

“My tenancy is a yearly one, my lord.”

“Is it, by thunder! And what do you pay me, eh?”

Taggart made an effort to control himself. “Six guineas for the land and two for the cottage, my lord.”

“That’s little enough. What’s to stop me doubling your rent, my fine fellow? You’d sing a different tune then, I guarantee.” Lawyer Slater caught his eye and shook his head warningly, but Lord Braxton was undeterred. “Ah, so he has a lease, has he? Well, no matter. As his landlord, is it not my duty under the Land Act to ensure that he farms productively?”

“That is a condition of his lease,” the lawyer confirmed. “It is not provided for under the Act of –”

“If it’s a condition of his lease, that will suffice. Very well, Taggart ... you will, in future, put ten acres under wheat.”

“My land will not grow wheat,” Taggart protested, his face the picture of dismay. “It will just be throwing good money after bad. Even if I were able to clear the heather and bracken, there is rock only a few inches beneath the surface. And my horses –”

“Yes, indeed, there are your horses. Well, I won’t be too hard on you, despite this matter of my fences.” Lord Braxton, sensing victory, was almost jocular. The sheep had gone now and the road, for the moment, was clear. “Come, let us see what you have for sale, shall we? If they are any good, I’ll take them off you at a fair price. That will buy you the seed you’ll require and the implements.”

Taggart’s wife, a comely, fair-haired young woman, watched their approach nervously, gathering her child to her as if fearing that the little girl might be in danger. Braxton gave her a curt nod, which did nothing to reassure her, and then turned his attention to the horses.

“Run them out,” he ordered. “I want to be sure they’re sound in wind and limb.”

Taggart stood mute, making no attempt to obey him, and Ned Waite slid from the saddle and, giving his reins to O’Keefe, freed the tether on the nearest of the young horses. They were crossbreeds but clearly of good stock, and Lord Braxton eyed them appreciatively as the bailiff trotted them past him in turn. He was reputed to be a good judge of horseflesh, and it was evident, from his expression, that all three young animals pleased him.

“Are they broken to harness?” he asked. Taggart inclined his head in resentful silence. “Good! And to the plow? Speak up, man, I can’t hear you!”

“Aye, the gelding is, not the others... .” The farmer met his wife’s frightened gaze and added a sullen, “My lord.” He was very white about the face, and his hands were shaking visibly. The old rector, taking pity on him and conscious that he had made a poor show of his defense, climbed stiffly down from his horse. O’Keefe relieved him of the animal, and he walked across to the far side of the dray where, for the moment, he was out of Lord Braxton’s sight and hearing.

Rachel Taggart greeted his arrival with touching gratitude, and the child made room for him on the seat between them, a shy smile lighting her pinched, solemn little face.

“It’s good of you to come, sir,” Rachel Taggart said. She hesitated and then bade the child alight. “Walk about, Jenny love, and stretch your legs for a minute or two. Don’t go too far, mind – stay where I can see you. And don’t trouble your father just now – he’s busy.” When the little girl was out of earshot, walking sedately along the road verge, Rachel went on, her voice flat and controlled, “Angus is in trouble, isn’t he?” It was more a statement than a question, and Simeon Akeroyd patted her hand awkwardly, having no choice but to confirm her fears.

“Yes, Rachel, I regret to say he is. But –”

“Serious trouble, Mister Akeroyd?” When he frowned, seeking the right words, she said vehemently, “I have to know, sir, else how can I help him? His lordship hasn’t stopped us just to buy horses – he could do that at the fair.”

“It’s the matter of those fences he put up to enclose the stray, I’m afraid,” the rector told her. “His lordship was extremely angry because they were pulled down and he –”

“But he cannot imagine Angus had aught to do with that!” Rachel protested.

“Bailiff Waite accused him of it, with that man they call the Gunner backing him up.”

“Those two rogues!” Rachel was contemptuous. “And they say Gunner O’Keefe’s not right in the head, Mister Akeroyd. Surely his lordship wouldn’t take their word against my husband’s?”

“I fear he seems inclined to, Rachel, my dear,” the rector admitted reluctantly. “At all events he realizes that Angus knows who did destroy those fences and he’s determined to force him to name them.”

“Which he will not?”

“So far he has refused to. But ...” He told her the rest and saw the color drain from her cheeks as she took in the implications of what he was saying.

“Ten acres under wheat and that’s – what did you call it, sir?”

“A condition of the lease. It means that Angus must fulfill it or lose his tenancy and that, I fear, can be enforced by law. But you will have a year’s grace, I think. Perhaps in a year, Rachel, it might be possible.”

“No.” There were tears in the soft brown eyes, and Rachel made no attempt to hide them. “No, it will not, Mister Akeroyd. We could not clear ten acres in time for sowing, even if we wanted to, and the land is poor ... the work would just be wasted. Besides, what Angus knows are his horses, he needs all his time for them. And if we are to lose the grazing on the stray, even their number will have to be cut down.” She caught her breath on a sigh. “He has worked so hard with them, and we were counting on a profit this year.”

“I am sorry,” the old rector said, overwhelmingly conscious of his own helplessness in the face of her distress. “I am truly sorry for you both. I’ll do what I can, of course – I’ll try to speak to his lordship, Rachel, but I fear he will not relent. Unless, of course – was he paused, eyeing her uncertainly.

She guessed what he was about to say and shook her head. “Angus will not betray his friends, sir, whatever it costs him and they ... well, they may be too fearful of his lordship to come forward and admit what they’ve done. They’ll help him, though, in any way they can – of that I’m sure.” Rachel glanced over to see the child retracing her steps and, swiftly dabbing at her eyes with a corner of her skirt, she summoned a smile. “I’d best keep Jenny with me until his lordship’s done with Angus. Poor little maid, we’d promised her a visit to the fair as a treat.” She called, and the little girl came running.

“Are we going now, Mam?” she asked eagerly. “Are we going?”

“In a little,” her mother promised. “Have patience, child.” She was still smiling and seemingly quite composed, and the rector marveled at her sturdy courage. He clambered down from the dray and offered his hand to enable Jenny to regain her lofty perch.

“You are looking forward to the fair, are you not, my little one?” he suggested and the child beamed.

“Oh, yes, sir, I am,” she assured him. “Dadda has promised he’ll buy me a new bonnet, you see – a bonnet with blue ribbons on it, for Sunday best.”

“I shall look to see you wearing it in Church next Sunday, then,” the rector said. He turned to take leave of Rachel Taggart, feeling a lump rise in his throat. These were good people, he thought wretchedly, they did not deserve what Lord Braxton was endeavoring to do to them. But it was happening all over the country. Braxton was not the only landlord seeking to wrest the few acres from folk of the Taggarts’ kind. Sheep were more profitable than people these days – and infinitely less trouble to the landowning gentry than tenant farmers, whose rents could not legally be increased.

As he took Rachel’s hand in his, Simeon Akeroyd wished fervently that it lay within his power to offer her practical help instead of the vague promises and the words of dubious comfort he was mouthing now. But, he was bitterly aware, it did not. Poor clerics like himself had no power; his own living depended very largely on the goodwill of the lord of the manor, and he was old, far from robust in health, with a family to provide for and not too many years between himself and penniless retirement. He could pray, of course, pray to the merciful God he served, and ...

“His lordship’s movin’ on, y’r rev’rince.” Gunner O’Keefe’s hoarse Irish voice sounded in his ear. “If ye’ll be so good as to get back on y’r horse now, I’ll be obliged to ye.”

He thrust the cob’s rein into its owner’s hand and, without waiting for him to mount, trotted off, grinning as usual to himself.

“Thank you for talking to me, sir,” Rachel Taggart said quietly. She got down, unasked, to hold the cob’s head and, as the old rector swung himself stifflimbed into the saddle, she added uncannily, as if she had read his earlier thoughts, “Do not concern yourself in this matter if it is likely to make trouble for you with his lordship, Mister Akeroyd. Angus would not want that, I know. He fought the king’s battles when he was a soldier, as bravely as ever Lord Braxton did ... and now he’ll fight his own.”

“I believe he will, my dear, with you beside him.”

Ashamed of the relief he felt, Reverend Simeon Akeroyd dug his heels once more into his horse’s sides and set off in pursuit of Lord Braxton. Over his shoulder, not trusting himself to look round, he gave the Taggarts a parting “God be with you!” that came from the heart.

Angus Taggart walked slowly back to the dray, leading his three young crossbreeds. He did not speak but busied himself adjusting their tethers at the rear of the cart, and Rachel, sensing the black anger which still gripped him, wisely left him alone. She got back into her seat and said gently to Jenny, “Be a good lass now and don’t ask your Dadda a lot of questions. Better still, go and lie down in the wagon – you were up early enough, you could sleep for a little. Here, take my shawl and wrap it round you.”

Jenny studied her face with startled eyes, but she obediently took the shawl. “We are going to the fair, aren’t we, Mam?” Her voice was anxious.

“Oh, yes, we’re going, love,” Rachel assured her, suddenly resolute. It might be the last fair they would ever go to in Milton, she thought, but it would take more than Lord Braxton to keep them away from this one. “Off you go and don’t fret,” she bade the child. “Dadda’s coming.”

Her husband seated himself at her side and took up the reins. They had driven for nearly a quarter of a mile in silence when he burst out furiously, “Well, have you nothing to say to me, woman – no questions to plague me with? Do you not care to know what his lordship was saying to me?”

“I was waiting for you to tell me in your own good time,” Rachel answered with unaccustomed meekness.

“Hoping that my rage would cool? Well, it will not!”

“But you are not angry with me, surely?” Rachel’s hand closed about his arm. She ventured a smile.

“No, no.” She had struck the right note, and he was instantly contrite, pressing her hand against his side. “Not with you ... with that unprincipled scoundrel Lord Braxton. You do not know what he is threatening, do you?”

“I do, Angus. The rector told me.” She turned to face him. “I said that you would not yield to threats – I said that you would fight him.”

“And so I will, wife! “Twill be over my dead body that he will evict us, that I swear. I ...” He hesitated, reddening. “I was not letting him have the horses. I refused to sell them to him.”

“You refused? Oh, Angus, was that wise? They are for sale, surely – does it matter who buys them?”

“Aye, at auction, for a fair price. He offered less than half their value, and Ned Waite claimed that the gelding was spavined. You know that’s not true.”

“Ned Waite is a wicked man,” she observed. “And Gunner O’Keefe another.”

“‘Twas they who started all this,” Angus said indignantly. “They were telling his lordship that they saw me digging up the fence posts on the stray and loading them onto my cart! I am wishing now that I had been there, since I am to be blamed for it – and I told his lordship so, to his face.” He repeated all that had been said and finished bitterly, “His lordship has no right to enclose the stray. If he is ordering more fences to be put up there, I shall be with the others when they are knocking them down.”

“And I will help you,” Rachel promised.

“Aye, I believe you would, lass.” He gave her his slow, warm smile. “I did not tell him who the others were, Rachel. I refused, when he asked me. That is the reason for his threats.”

“Yes, I know.” They were on the outskirts of the town now, the crowd thickening and a medley of sound reaching them from the fairground. Rachel took off her kerchief, flattened it carefully on her knee, and then replaced it on her head, thrusting some unruly curls within its confines.

Angus gestured with his whip. “I will be letting the two of you off there, so that you may go round the stalls, whilst I am entering my animals for the auction. It should be over by half past three, four at the latest, and I will meet you where I put you down.”

“And you will buy Jenny her bonnet,” Rachel reminded him.

“As if she will be letting me forget! Let her choose the one she wants, and I will pay for it from my sale money.” Angus laughed, his good humor restored. “I will grow that wheat, Rachel – I will grow it if it kills me. Braxton shall not have my land.” He brought the dray to a standstill and roused the sleeping child with a playful poke from his whip. “Bestir yourself little lazybones! We are here.”

Jenny tumbled out of the wagon, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. Clinging eagerly to her mother’s hand, she led her from stall to stall. The old cobbled marketplace was gay with bunting, the stalls with their striped awnings displaying all manner of enticing wares. There were jugglers and acrobats, organ grinders with their grotesque little monkeys – even a dancing bear, in cap and muzzle, treading a clumsy measure at the end of its long chain.

For a while Rachel was caught up in the general bustle and excitement, exchanging greetings with neighbors and childhood friends from her own part of the dales and sharing Jenny’s enjoyment as the little girl shrilled with delight at her first Punch and Judy show. They bought gingerbread and apples for their midday meal, munching them as they moved about amongst the cheerful, laughing crowd, and Jenny spent a long time choosing the bonnet her father was to buy for her, setting first one and then another on her curly head and tying and retying their bows beneath her chin.

But at last the choice was made, the bonnet set aside until they should return to claim it, and they continued their wandering between the stalls and the tented sideshows, footsore now and conscious of weariness as the excitement began to pall and the crowds to thin. Rachel had no pennies left to spend on sideshows or refreshment, and the memory of the earlier happenings of the day, which she had put resolutely from her mind, returned to plague her.

They were early at the agreed meeting place but, to her dismay, Rachel saw that Angus was before them. One glance at his face was enough, and her heart sank. With a whispered warning to Jenny to keep a still tongue in her head, she hurried toward him, somehow managing to smile.

“He bought the horses!” Angus flung at her. “Bought all three of them, damn him to hell! And for half what they should have fetched. This is what I got for them.” He held out his hand, letting her see the coins that lay on his palm, letting her count them.

“You – you mean Lord Braxton?” Rachel stammered, shocked. He was right, she knew – the young horses should have sold for twice as much. “But how did he get them for so little?”

“Ned Waite was the only man to bid for them,” Angus told her. His voice shook with the effort he made to contain his fury. “Not another soul opened his mouth. It was as if they had all been struck dumb – yet the bidding was brisk enough until my animals came up.”

“Oh, Angus!” They looked at each other despairingly, the child momentarily forgotten.

“We had best go home,” Angus said at last. “I have the wagon ready. Come, Jenny ...” He made to lift her on to his shoulders, but she eluded him, her eyes brimming with tears. “Ah, now, what ails you, my wee hen? I was thinking you would be tired and wanting your Dadda to ride you back to the wagon.”

“But my bonnet ...” Jenny reminded him, a catch in her voice. “We chose it and it’s beautiful, Dadda. Please ... can you not buy it after all?”

Angus dropped to his knees beside her, gathering her to him. “You shall have your bonnet, my little love. Dadda promised you, did he not?”

She hid her tear-wet face against his broad chest, and her voice was muffled as she answered, “It has blue ribbons and I told the rector I would wear it to Church on Sunday.”

“And so you shall,” her father vowed. Meeting Rachel’s gaze over the child’s bent head, he said vehemently, “He’ll not make me break my word to my own lass. I’ll buy her that bonnet if it’s the last thing I ever do!”

Chapter II

Her Sunday bonnet was, as things turned out, the last present Jenny ever had from her father. Years later when the straw of which it was composed had long since disintegrated, she kept its tattered blue ribbon as a talisman, for the memories of past happiness that it invoked.

She knew and understood little of the events that led up to her father’s death or of the persecution he endured during the long winter which followed the fair, but she guessed, from his stooped shoulders and weary gait, that he was hard put to it to manage the work of the farm and cope with his horses as well. He was out in all weathers, from dawn to dusk, endeavoring to clear the ten acres of rough scrubland that must be sown with wheat in the spring. Sometimes, her mother told her, a few of the neighbors helped, but mostly it was only she who aided him, as best she could, in the backbreaking task he had set himself. The heavy snow, which came with Christmas and continued well into the new year, was a relief to both of them, although neither put it into words.

Jenny saw more of them then, for they were compelled to keep to the house for days at a time, leaving it only in order to feed the horses or struggle through deep drifts to attend Church. She remembered the Christmas Eve carol service and the one on Christmas Day as highlights in that bleak winter, but she remembered, too, her father’s angry distress when he returned to find the padlocked gate on the brood mares’ shelter broken and two of the mares gone. He had recovered them by late evening, but one had foaled prematurely, and all his care could not save her puny offspring from the effects of many hours’ exposure to a freezing wind.

With the coming of better weather, he was out again to tackle the last of the clearing, and he was proud and happy, Jenny recalled, when he was able to tell her mother that the land was ready for the plow. A fortnight later she and her mother accompanied him to Milton Overblow in the dray, to buy and bring back with them the sacks of seed. Neither mentioned it, but the child sensed, from the care with which her parents stowed the precious grain sacks in a locked outhouse, that their purchase had cost them most of their ready cash ... there had been no shopping done in Milton Market, despite the tempting array of goods on the stalls and in the shops. That evening, the brood mares – now in an open paddock – again made their escape and when Angus Taggart returned with the haltered fugitives at midnight, it was to find the lock on the outhouse shattered and half the seed sacks ripped open and the rest dumped into the stream at the back of the paddock.

They salvaged what they could, Jenny helping them, but it was little enough; and her father’s face was black as thunder when he shoveled the muddy, swollen heads of grain into his small work cart and went to sow it – some already sprouting – in the land he had prepared so laboriously to receive it. Miraculously, though, it came up and her mother wept with joy when, with Jenny beside her, she trudged up the steep hillside to see, for herself, the bright green shoots pushing up to cover the ridges of turned earth, where once there had been only bracken and rock.

“It is the answer to prayer,” she told Jenny through her tears. “Not ten acres, it’s true, but seven perhaps ... and thanks be to God for it!”

May came, and June, and they were months of warm sunshine, with just enough rain to replenish the grazing and make the stray a picture. Lord Braxton’s fences went up, were knocked down, erected again, and once more uprooted, both posts and rails smashed with axes and left where they lay, so that no charges of theft might be laid. This time, Angus aided his neighbors in the work of destruction. It was openly discussed, in the little ale house at the head of Wrekin Dale.

Once Angus came home from the ale house with an eye closed and blackened and the knuckles of both hands skinned, but Jenny noticed that her mother did not reproach him when he told her, with a sheepish smile, that Ned Waite had a broken jaw and Gunner O’Keefe, together with two more of his lordship’s men, had fled and were unlikely to enter the portals of the Rose and Cushion again.

For a while an uneasy truce prevailed. The fences on the stray were not repaired and the smallholders’ cattle and horses grazed freely on the lush summer grass. But then came the night that Jenny would remember with heartbreak for as long as she lived ... and it came without warning, when she and her parents were in bed. Her first inkling that something was wrong was when the sound of men’s voices wakened her from sleep. The voices were soft, as if they were not intended to be heard and, when she went to the window, all she could see were shadowy figures, moving with silent purposefulness at the rear of her father’s small wooden stable. He kept the Clydesdale workhorses there, together with their harness and his plow and carts, Jenny knew, and she peered out anxiously, wondering whether the men were there at her father’s invitation and if he were with them. If so, there was no cause for alarm but ... She glimpsed a torch, suddenly flaming in the darkness, and then a second and a third and, panic-stricken, heard a bellow of crazy laughter and a voice she recognized.

Gunner O’Keefe. Jenny ran, barefoot and frightened, to rouse her parents. Her father was instantly alert, taking in her stammered warning as he hurled himself from the bed to don breeches and boots. But long before he reached the yard, the flimsy wooden building was ablaze from end to end and the men had gone, the distant thud of their horses’ hoofs muted by the crackle of the flames.

“Water!” Angus shouted hoarsely. “Bring me all the buckets you can lay hands on, lass – and tell your mother to do the same. I must get those poor beasts out before they suffocate.”

He was ripping his shirt from his back as he dashed into the burning stable, smashing down the door with his booted foot and, as Jenny and her mother filled buckets from the horse trough on the far side of the yard, they saw him emerge, gasping, with one of the Clydesdales. The terrified animal was whinnying and struggling and, despite the strip of cloth Angus had bound about its eyes, he could hardly hold it and he let it go, shouting something that Jenny could not hear. Then he went back into the smoke and flames, and moments later the roof of the stable caved in, a shower of sparks leaping skyward as the beams crashed down.

The second plow horse plunged to safety and galloped off, and Jenny, running with her bucket of water, saw that the smoldering remnant of her father’s shirt covered the frightened creature’s eyes. She waited, expecting her father to follow it but he did not and her mother pulled her back when, crying his name in an agony of fear, she tried to go in search of him.

Neighbors came to assist in fighting the fire and when it was out at last, two or three of the men ventured into the gutted shell of the building. After a long wait they carried out a scorched and blackened object which might have been a log, but was, in fact Angus Taggart’s body.

Some of the women stayed with Rachel; another took Jenny away and, bedding her with her own brood, with rough, inarticulate pity, bade her sleep if she could. Frantically though she pleaded, the child was not allowed to return to her own home until the day of her father’s funeral. Then, numb with grief, she walked at her mother’s side through the little churchyard to the graveside, seeing only the scorched log as they lowered the coffin into the moist brown earth, unable to believe that it was her father whom they were laying to rest with so much somber pomp. The old rector’s words of sympathy, uttered with genuine feeling, left her as numb as before, and when the neighbors gathered in her mother’s kitchen to partake of the refreshment, which, it seemed, was customary on such occasions, Jenny could only stand in sullen silence, hoping and praying for them to go.

When, hours later, they did so and she was alone with her mother, she was still unable to find any words to say and she ran out into the darkness, unhappy and bitterly ashamed of what she knew was unmannerly behavior. It was not until the following day that her mother confided her plans for the future to her.

“I shall engage a hired man, Jenny, to work the land with me,” Rachel said decisively. “There are plenty who would come, for their board and little more. And if we can get the workhorses back, I’m sure we shall manage. It’s what your Dadda would have wanted – God rest his brave soul, he fought hard enough to keep Lord Braxton from claiming his land. And I’m not one to give up. We’ll sell off what young stock there are and buy sheep, in their stead ... I was brought up on a sheep farm and I could manage a small flock well enough. But you will have to help me, lass, young as you are.”

“I will, Mam!” Jenny promised. “Oh, gladly I will.”

They made plans, both of them finding a new purpose in the planning but their dreams were short-lived. The two plow horses, which had cost Angus Taggart his life, never reappeared – they had vanished into the darkness and the darkness had, it seemed, swallowed them without trace. Exhaustive inquiries yielded nothing, and even the sale of all the young stock did not raise sufficient money to replace the missing animals and buy sheep as well.

It was, however, a visit from Lawyer Slater which finally shattered all Rachel’s brave hopes. He came to the point without preamble, not deigning to alight from his horse. “The tenancy was in your husband’s name, Mistress Taggart, not in yours. With his demise all rights revert to Lord Braxton and his lordship wishes to take the holding for his own use. It is all, of course, perfectly legal ...” He quoted the provisions of the law, his tone stern and even a trifle threatening, as if he anticipated an argument. When Rachel offered none, he continued less aggressively. “His lordship does not wish to cause you undue hardship. I am to give you a month’s notice, here and now, to vacate your – that is, to vacate Lord Braxton’s cottage. It will be pulled down, one month from today – that is, to be precise, the thirtieth of July.”

“And if I do not vacate?” Rachel asked, in a small voice. “What then, Mister Slater?”

“You will be forcibly evicted and your household goods seized,” he informed her coldly. “My clerk will see that you receive your notice in writing, of course, and it will be duly recorded in the parish records. I give you good day, Mistress Taggart.”

When he had gone, Rachel stumbled back into the cottage, white and trembling. But she did not weep, as Jenny had feared she might, and she answered the little girl’s questions with patient forbearance. Then, donning a bonnet and shawl, she went to seek advice from some of her neighbors.

It was after midnight when she returned, and Jenny, who had been dozing, eyed her with sleepy bewilderment when she said, “I’ve made my mind up, Jenny lass. Wake up now and listen! We’re going to London. They say there’s plenty of work for honest folk there, with all the fine houses and the wealthy gentry always wanting servants.”

“London?” Jenny echoed, shocked into wakefulness. “But London’s such a long way away, Mam.” The prospect terrified her. “We’d never get there.”

“We will,” her mother assured her. “If we set our minds to it.”

“Could we not go to your folk instead? That would not be so far and –”

“They’ve enough mouths to feed and a hard enough time doing it. And I could not go back, not now, not after all that’s happened. I’d not be able to hold my head up.” Rachel bit back a sigh. “People talk, you see, love, and besides there would be no work there. My Dad and my brothers work the farm – we should just be a burden to them and I’d not want that.”

“I don’t want to go away from here,” Jenny whispered, near to tears. “Oh, Mam, I don’t want to!”