The Royal Changeling Read online

  Oglethorpe received a torrid welcome.

  His mount bucked and reared as it was slashed about, threatening to unseat him. Yelling men attempted to pierce his breast. Deep amongst the forest of pole-arms he saw his deputy, the Irishman, Captain Sarsfield, brought low with a musket-butt and left for dead. It seemed quite likely he also would not emerge from the crazy dance and yet Theophilus was content. There was pleasure in moment-to-moment living and the escape from being … himself. Whilst avoiding and delivering death there was no time to ponder which way the world should go.

  By contrast, ‘King Monmouth’ had ample space for that very speculation. Resplendent in scarlet trimmed with gold, armed with a half-pike, he strode up and down the line and thought of little else. For all that his daring plan had stalled he hadn’t yet despaired. His every desire and everything – in the truest sense – still hung in the balance. Amid the pre-dawn gloom and powder murk he continued to look for … unanswerable reinforcement.

  And beneath the tor, at the place the newcomers called Glastonbury, Artorious Rex, Dux Bellorum, past and (possibly) future King, began to rise.

  ‘POSTSCRIPT: A MYSTERY OF THE BATTLE’

  (Appendix F of Bridgwater Booklet No. 4) by M. Page:

  ‘The Battle of Sedgemoor’ (Bridgwater, 1932)

  ‘Although Feversham’s story of the battle hangs together fairly well it is a little difficult.

  ‘He tells us that at “a quarter before one” a.m. he rode back from the moor to Westonzoyland. He had waited late for a message from Oglethorpe, who was supposed to be watching on Knowle Hill. As no message came he returned to his quarters in the village.

  ‘But at “a quarter after one” (please note the hour) “came Sir Hugh Mydlleton with one of Collonell Oglethorpe’s party” bearing the belated message that he “could not perceive the least motion of the enemy!”

  ‘If we give the trooper half an hour for his ride from Knowle he started about a quarter to one.

  ‘But Lieutenant Dummer, an exact man, says that the rebels reached the fighting line by two o’clock. They must have been swarming, therefore, in the tracks between Knowle Hill and the moor by one o’clock or earlier.

  ‘How, then could the trooper ride right along their path via Langmoor stone without seeing or hearing anything of them?

  ‘It seems almost an impossibility …

  ‘All very mysterious. We are almost driven to a suspicion that “Zummerzet Zider” was more potent than they had imagined, which would account for anything.’

  THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 1648

  ‘And this, Highness, is Mistress Walter, a fellow expatriate. Goodness, is that the time …?’

  The Courtier tried to guide the Prince onwards but the way remained barred. He sighed. Factions defeated in war soon got to learn that life could wear a permanent scowl, becoming just one damn thing after another. Even a simple promenade round these dull Dutch streets proved to be studded with misfortune’s cowpats.

  ‘Mistress Lucy Walter,’ simpered the strumpet before them, curtseying deeply and thus directing her face close to the princely crotch. ‘At your service, Highness.’

  ‘Well, hello …’ said Charles Stuart, attempting to twirl his adolescent, twelve-a-side, attempt at a moustache in the correct cavalier manner. The young Prince was not quite as experienced as he made out – and certainly less so than this brazen hussy – but he acted the part well enough. Libertines to model himself on were one thing the impoverished court-in-exile didn’t lack. Charles recalled, and then rejected, the lines successful with peasant girls whilst cooped up in Jersey. In propositioning the higher classes one didn’t need to be so subtle.

  ‘Mistress Lucy, eh?’ he smarmed. ‘Not my mistress as far as I know; not yet anyway.’

  The Courtier gaped in admiration and amazement as Walter mustered a halfway convincing blush. If she could so control her capillaries, what other tricks was she capable of?

  ‘Why Sir,’ she trilled, half averting her great limpid eyes in a way that said ‘yes, yes, YES!’, ‘you are too forward …’

  Prince Charles beamed wolfishly down upon her.

  ‘Well then, missy, if so, there’s always backwards, is there not?’

  They both laughed, intimate conspirators already, two shrewd and unshockable products of their time.

  The Courtier was likewise unmoved. His Anglican sensitivities had been deadened in the course of long, loyal service to his King and by the sights civil war had shown him. Prudence, however, remained even if piety was fled. Across the water was England where they soon must go. Parliament’s principal fleet had deserted the usurpers and now awaited the Prince’s pleasure – for the fickle moment. In a week or so, two at the most, this young Prince must sail with them and cross swords with the arch-fiend Cromwell and his New Model Army. Likewise, even here, eating the bread of exile in the Netherlands, there was no safety or occasion for ease. Parliament’s agents and assassins swarmed like blow-flies, ready to save themselves the bother of a battle and thwart God’s will with a bullet. This was no time for soft considerations. He whispered as much to his Prince.

  ‘Rest easy,’ Charles confided back. ‘At present I am as hard as could be wished …’

  The Courtier sighed again. Was it for this he had given up house and home and lost lands held by his family since the Conqueror’s time? For the thousandth time since Edgehill and the first effusion of blood, he consulted in memory the motto painted, ages past, above his ancestral hearth: ‘Fear God and Honour the King’. Well, that was a stark enough instruction, an incitement to fresh resolve.

  ‘Mistress Walter is a much-loved figure in these parts,’ he explained to the Prince in a voice heavy with meaning, ‘and in other parts as well.’

  ‘My parts agree, so it seems,’ said Charles, winking at his breeches.

  ‘And she is currently very friendly with loyal Colonel Robert Sidney, great-nephew of the renowned poet and warrior, Sir Philip.’

  ‘I know him well; he’s Chamberlain to my sister Mary; a most … accommodating fellow.’

  The Courtier at last despaired of victory in this engagement and drew back a pace to let the two eighteen-year-olds exchange what whispered lewderies they would. Whilst the illicit transaction was arranged, he refreshed mind and eye in dwelling upon the stately buildings and linden-fringed canals of the Hague. It was better, he consoled himself, that what scant influence he mustered be husbanded for some more vital test of strength.

  He was never more wrong. Even restraining Charles I from charging to an honourable death when Naseby Field was lost was not such an innocent disservice to the cause he’d given all for. Out of ignorance, everything in the Cosmos he held dear was put at risk. Fortunately though, through God’s kindness, the Courtier died soon after, worn out by faithful service and tired of life, still wrapped in that same blessed lack of knowledge.

  Meanwhile, Prince Charles eventually returned to his side, pleased and guiltless as a tom-cat with what had been decided.

  ‘Now then,’ he purred, ‘you were saying about muskets …’

  Lucy Walter a.k.a. Lucy Barlow, Lucy Sidney – and many other temporary names, departed similarly pleased. Still in the bloom of youth, despite life’s rough usage, she’d needed only low level spells to secure the entrapment.

  The gentleman-of-the-bedchamber consulted his timepiece by candlelight.

  ‘Fan-my-brow!’ he whispered to his colleague. ‘It’s four o’clock and His Highness is still screaming!’

  ‘Only to be expected. Mistress Walter is Welsh.’

  ‘I did not know that.’

  ‘Indeed so, born and bred.’

  ‘But of what consequence is the information?’

  The gentleman was looked on with horror and pity by all the courtiers and bodyguards assembled outside the bedroom doors.

  ‘Do you mean to say,’ he was asked, ‘that you have never heard of the Welsh erotic arts?’

  Prince – King-to-be, when his father’s head part
ed from its shoulders – Charles was kept screaming until four o’clock – or even later – throughout his brief stay. Advisors tut-tutted about the dark rings growing beneath his eyes but were powerless to intervene. Bold Lucy Walter had him in her thrall and demanded constant … attention. It had to be so. Persistence and repetition were an absolute necessity for what she had in mind. When novelty faded and even her Cymric skills palled, she had recourse to less natural magic to ensure continued jousts. Between proficiency and sorcery she managed to hold on to him for long enough.

  Neither were so tedious as to remain faithful for that would have seemed pedestrian and suspicious in the time and place. A superabundance of easy temptation and the climate of a world-turned-upside-down precluded it. Besides, their time together was no idyll. Charles came and went – so to speak – to strive and plot and debate, having the minor matter of a lost throne to deal with. Absence helped ensure that passion’s flint continued to spark. And if in the meanwhile either sought alternative comfort, what did that signify? The world had tumbled about their ears long before they met; Englishman killed Englishman and the howling storms of change drowned out quieter counsels. Everyone conformed to the outer chaos in those days.

  Lucy was less than quarter-elf but that unhuman portion still made crossbreeding a hit and miss affair. She applied what charms she knew, eschewed all contraception and pampered her ovaries with peppermint in the prescribed way. After that it was a matter of luck and application. There was no question of seeking advice from the elder race, even assuming they would answer. She knew she should not mix her blood with any ‘newcomer’ king: that was the one forbidden thing. What Lucy proposed would not be approved of – in the most violent manner.

  Then, one night in July ‘48, in the disordered days between their ‘chance’ meeting and Charles’s sailing with the turncoat fleet, the unlikely occurred. Perhaps simple passion made possible what Elf-lore deemed doubtful. Whatever the reason, Lucy’s project, for which she’d set aside years, was crowned with prompt success. In a theatre-box at the Hague (disrupting an actor’s tragic soliloquy), or a private dining room in Scheveningen, or in a coach en route to Rotterdam – or perhaps another snatched moment of delight – their joint and vigorous efforts were deservedly smiled upon. One Royal sperm, less fastidious than his five hundred million fellow voyagers, took a fancy to an almost-human egg. They touched – and embraced. The future Duke of Monmouth began his long, slow, journey towards the light.

  Lucy Walter was informed soon after: as chance dictated during a subsequent bout. Better-than-human senses announced it with a roar of joy that emerged on Earth via her coquettish squeak. Prince Charles mistook it for an involuntary round of applause and prided himself on what a jolly dog he was. Lucy noted that superior smirk crossing his dark features and smiled also. Though cruel enough when required – or (Elf-blood coming through) even when not – she didn’t disabuse him. On the contrary, made charitable by triumph, she was happy to reward him and bolster his bravado.

  ‘Oh, sire,’ she gasped, allowing her at-will Welsh accent to swing wide and free, ‘there’s … magnificent, you are.’

  Charles had been half-minded to get up and wipe himself on the curtains, but he was willing to linger on for this.

  ‘I’ve had no complaints,’ he mused.

  Lucy affected continued breathlessness.

  ‘You puissant beast!’ she heaved. ‘This fortress cannot stand against you!’

  ‘A bit of a conqueror, is that what you think, eh?’ He was rather basking in it, for all his dislike and distrust of people.

  ‘Oh … yes! A rampaging, victorious Sultan, my oath! If you were to assault these walls again, I should think I might have to surrender …’

  Charles puffed out his cheeks. ‘Actually, best we rest a bit first, there’s a limit to what even I …’

  Lucy sprinkled a little magic on him and he was instantly interested.

  ‘Oh, prime that love-musket again,’ she purred, ‘and invade the realm of Venus. Ignore my piteous calls for mercy, mercy, mercy …’

  Her objective was achieved. For once the world was opening wide to her command, rather than the usual opposite. She’d had to dance to some peculiar, tiring, music in her time, but now there was every hope, via mothering an exalted child, of more melodic tunes in future. In gate-crashing the Stuart dynasty and injecting the all-knowing older-blood, she even saw hope of composing one or two puppet-shows of her own for the high and mighty to jig to.

  Thus, though strictly speaking there was no real point to a further encounter right now, Lucy felt like celebrating. And besides, there was the need to humour Charles. He was as sweet and kind as life allowed him to be – perhaps even a little bit more so – but a dark edge had been grafted on him. It was necessary that he be of a mind to recognise the child when it arrived. Future jousts were also required. She had taken steps to ensure a boy, but even so, another – or a third – would be welcome, just to make sure of things.

  ‘Do you know,’ said Charles, ‘I’m in a mad mood. A cannon might take me head off next week. You’re not like other women. For two shakes of a dog’s tail, I’d damn well marry you!’

  This was unexpected; beyond her wildest dreams. By sheer good fortune, Lucy had tapped into the last remaining vein of warmth in Charles.

  ‘There’s no dog to hand,’ she said swiftly, lifting up the bedcovers and turning on her belly, ‘but a tail I can provide. Will its shaking suffice?’

  Charles feasted his eyes.

  ‘More than, Madame,’ he husked.

  ‘I’ll do things for you other girls don’t,’ she promised. ‘Or can’t – or won’t! And I think we can manage more than just two shakes …’

  Lucy Walter, for all her faults, was a pleasure to do business with, and the unorthodox marriage contract was soon concluded.

  ‘Well, do you or don’t you?’ The little Dutch Pastor was so exasperated, he forgot he was in the presence of a Prince and let his anger show.

  ‘Do I what?’ slurred Charles as two gentlemen-of-the-bed-chamber restored him to upright.

  ‘Take this woman!’ repeated the Pastor for the umpteenth time.

  Charles screwed up his eyes and tried to make the room stand still. Leaning belligerently close he breathed brandy all over the Dutchman.

  ‘Night and day: all the time,’ he bellowed. ‘But what’s it got to do with you?’

  The Pastor was about to throw up his hands but was distracted by someone else, fortunately neither bride nor groom, throwing up for real. Charles turned unsteadily round.

  ‘That’s it, Colonel Griff,’ he urged the man on, ‘better out than in!’

  ‘Speak for yourself!’ shrieked Lucy Walter, soon-to-be Stuart, lasciviously eyeing her prospective husband.

  The Pastor would have left them but for catching the gaze of one of the bodyguards at the door. This man had been obliged to remain sober and was none too happy about it. A face forged into fury by Marston Moor and Naseby stated that until the job was done, his way was barred.

  ‘Look,’ the Pastor pleaded with the Prince, ‘just tell me if you take her as your wife …’

  Charles tried to get his fuddled brain round this complicated question. He looked down on the tottering bride. Alcohol converted her into a goddess of desirability, wrapped in liftable liquid silk. However, now he looked, he noticed one of the drunken bridesmaids was quite presentable too – especially sprawled invitingly on the floor like that. Was it the mussulman faith that permitted more than one wife? Which religion was he? He could nearly grasp the name of it – something to do with that Jesus fellow. It was all too difficult to think through: far easier to just agree.

  ‘’Course I do. I don’t take her for me damned brother, do I?’

  The Pastor seized the answer like a drowning man: it would do.

  ‘And what about you?’ he asked Lucy, viewing her with mixed amazement and distaste. He was troubled with sinful thoughts of heaving dunes and hills – and just as
worried about her heaving all over him.

  ‘Oh, I do,’ she laughed, giving the little churchman her best ‘don’t bother thinking about it, you couldn’t afford me’ look.

  ‘Then, in the averted’, (he whispered), ‘eyes of Almighty God, I pronounce you man and wife – or something. Can you sign the certificate?’

  ‘I’ll have a go,’ said Charles manfully, and lurched out of the grasp of his two bearers towards the table. Moving like a man deep underwater he drew a blotted, erratic, but just recognisable, ‘Carolus regis filius’ on the proffered document. Lucy likewise flounced forward and, with immense concentration, tongue gripped between full lips, painstakingly drew a huge ‘X’.

  ‘And the witnesses?’ said the Pastor, looking longingly out of the window.

  Such was the gravity attached to this semi-secret match that no member of Charles’s retinue had been willing to put his name to any record of it. The Prince had laughed that off and directed that two innocent Dutch passers-by be seized to do the deed. They now stood shiftily by the door, clutching their gold-sovereign fee, and wondering what the devil this collection of drunken demons were about. It amused the sober guard to encourage them forward with the point of his rapier on their behinds.

  ‘Don’t ask,’ said the Pastor despairingly, in the local Dutch dialect, ‘just sign.’

  They did so, taking care to make their signatures indecipherable, and then fled away.

  One, a tall man, clad in bourgeois black, lingered enough to humbly bestow a word on the bride. Assuming it to be in the native gobbledegook, no one paid attention – except Lucy. Because of it, the erotic tingle in her limbs, the warm brandy-bath in which she swam, were both instantly stilled and chilled. Sobriety returned like a tidal wave and she was forced to remember what she often forgot: that actions have consequences. Frozen by fright, she could not prevent his departure, nor would it have been wise to try. She had noted the flecks of gold in his oval eyes, observed the unkind smile in the pale face. He was of her race, but a full-breed. It was doubtful these tipsy cavaliers could have detained him.