The Royal Changeling

by John Whitbourn

Genres: Religious & Inspirational; Science Fiction; Sci-fi Action & Adventure; Alternative History sci-fi

Synopsis

1st edition paperback fine

Release date: April 30, 1998

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Ltd

Print pages: 280

Sample

The army was strung out in a column over a mile long, all the way from the Bridgwater road to right past Peasey Farm. Two abreast, they struggled along in the dark and damp, ignorant of everything bar the back of the man ahead. The Duke had ordered that ‘whosoever made a noise should be knocked dead by his neighbour’ and contrary to every expectation, the great silence was kept.

For all that it was July and supposedly summer, a ground mist arose to assist their secret progress and hopes rose with it. The God-given guide seemed to know his way through this maze of brimful ditches, out into the squelching marsh. The house of the government supporter in Bradney Lane was circumvented. No alarm was called, no shot rang out. Soon enough they would be at the Langmoor Stone, which marked the upper plungeon across Bussex Rhine. Then the way would be clear to a surpassing victory. Muskets and pikes and mounted scythe-blades were clutched all the more closely. After all the years of sullen endurance and turning the cheek, they would assuredly be put to good use. In the mighty camp at Zog-by-Zoyland, the Royal forces continued their negligent sleep.

The soldiers of God did not pass entirely unobserved. In purportedly loyal Chedzoy, two men of the village watch stood and quietly observed the long column parade past into Bradney Lane. Strangely enough, it didn’t occur to them to discharge a warning blast or hot-foot it to the King’s Camp. Instead, ‘out of country dullness and slowness’ (in the later, charitable, explanation of their Rector) they just strolled off and made themselves comfortable in a nearby windmill. When dawn came and the mist rose, they’d have a grandstand view of the fight to come.

A young Bridgwater lady, more zealous in his Majesty’s cause, had stolen out of the town when the rebels were standing to arms in Castle Field, and hastened to Zog, to warn the Royal Army of impending doom. Unfortunately, the men-in-arms she met had learned their manners in Scotland and Tangiers and were inflamed with Zoyland cider. Brutally dishonoured, she fled in anger and tears, her message undelivered, leaving her ravishers to death in this world and damnation in the next.

Before the rebels marched, their foremost minister, Robert ‘the Plotter’ Ferguson, had preached to them from Joshua, 22, challenging God to turn his face against them that day if their cause was not truly his also. His angry Scottish tones ensured the meaning was largely lost on the West-country audience but the Almighty presumably heard. So far the Presbyterian’s rash request had gone unrebuked. On the contrary, his blackmailing of the Infinite was meeting with miraculous success.

On the opposing side, Lieutenant Colonel Theophilus Oglethorpe, attached to the Royal Regiment of Horse, the ‘Blues’, likewise believed in miracles. It was implausible, he granted, that an army of 5000 should promenade at night, undetected – but not impossible. Moreover, their ‘king’ and general, The Duke of Monmouth, wasn’t averse to asking favours of Lady Luck – and gaining them by his audacious charm. Thus, for all that it was chill and inhospitable, and the hour of the soul’s lowest ebb, Oglethorpe decreed that the intricate dance of the Royal scouts round the rebels must continue. The troopers of the Blues, dreaming of firesides – and other warm spots – in London, were reluctant to comply. Oglethorpe pretended not to notice; once out and about they’d soon rekindle some enthusiasm. Dozing and saucy dreams were better, but there was still a measure of fun to be had in hounding nonconformists.

At his station up on Knowle Hill, that last outcrop of the Poldens, at rest on the old Roman road which crossed it, Theophilus had been tempted to kindly thoughts. Back at Westbrook House, far away in Surrey, his children would be abed and he wondered what they dreamed of. A curiously clear picture of his home hovered before him, blotting out the weirder landscape below. He saw the River Wey, heading leisurely to the Thames, and the valley-confined streets of industrial Godalming. The Lieutenant Colonel missed those familiar sights more than a man bred to arms sensibly should. The next step would be to consider if he would ever return; an unhelpful meditation for a soldier on the brink of battle. He harshly willed the vision to be gone.

The real view spread before him was less endearing. Out of the moonlit sea of mist rose the steeple of Bawdrip and the Towers of Chedzoy and Westonzoyland Churches. Of the watery world between nothing was visible. Somewhere down there was an insurgent army hell-bent on the overturning of order – and the ending of his own tiny story, given the chance. He had clashed with them once before, at Keynsham, and had the better of it on that occasion. Now it was time to put away soft considerations and bring matters to a final trial of strength. Once, not so long ago, he had fought alongside the Duke, in Scotland and the Low Countries; they had been friends, insofar as men of blood ever are. Now his vaunting ambitions threatened Theophilus with seeing Westbrook no more – not to mention more universal ruin. Their paths, once parallel, had parted and now converged only to collide. It was sad – but the Duke of Monmouth had to go.

Lieutenant Colonel Oglethorpe also had to go: not to the executioner’s block and thence to Hell, but down into the white sea below Bawdrip. It was his duty to hazard the Bridgwater ‘Long Causey’ road and see what went on at the end of it. Feversham and Churchill feared the rebels might flit away by night for another try at Bristol, thereby to prolong the agony. Theophilus was thus minded to rouse them up and pin them down, ensuring a speedier return to Godalming. At his command, the two hundred Blues mounted up and jangled down the hill, along what passed for a road hereabouts, towards Bridgwater.

Ever after, History held Oglethorpe to account for strange inattention. How was it, later scholars not unreasonably asked, that he did not detect the rebels had quit the town? 5000 insurgents were not the sort of thing you easily overlooked. ‘Anything else to report?’ ‘Oh, yes, I nearly forgot. There’s 5000 maniacs on their way here to slit our throats as we sleep.’ Did it not occur to him, ask the omni-competent commentators, to check that enemy were safely tucked up in their Bridgwater beds? Must not, at one point, the whole rebel army have passed below his position? The night march of the rebels under Oglethorpe’s nose was the one great unsolved mystery of Sedgemoor.

The Lieutenant Colonel was never able to defend his good name with the truth. Fortunately he more than made amends later in the day and so didn’t have to. It would have been but a poor defence in a court martial to plead prior, pressing, business with a ghost.

The King of Logres came floating out of the mist he had created, his rotting boots skimming over, but not touching, the soil of his realm.

‘Stand, in the name of the King!’ he said. The commanding voice sounded not from the regal body, but from some vast and echoing place far away.

Oglethorpe had gone ahead with four good troopers. Each obeyed directly, despite their advantage in numbers – and their mounts likewise. Men and beasts were frozen, mid-canter; suspended in fluid poses of motion. Theophilus noted their blank, unknowing expressions and saw that the stars had ceased to twinkle. The hooves of the main body following on were heard no more.

Only partly pleased by exemption from the cessation of time, he wheeled his own horse to meet the King. The animal first shied away and then was overcome. It went down on one front knee and made obeisance. Gravity and dignity obliged Oglethorpe to dismount.

The King held out his armoured hand.

‘Will you not also do homage?’ he hissed, so very reasonably. The Lieutenant Colonel did not approach.

‘I know you can speak,’ he persevered. ‘My spell did not include you. Speak words to your King.’

Theophilus did not demean himself by reaching for sword or pistol. He knew that they were vain tools in present circumstances. Integrity was his best remaining weapon.

‘I cannot address my King,’ he said, quietly. ‘He is not here.’

The great figure hovering before him tilted its head, the better to catch the Lieutenant Colonel’s speech. It listened, and then the vast helm of iron shook slowly from side to side.

‘Such … sadness …’ said the voice from elsewhere.

Courage begat more courage, and therein Theophilus found the strength to burn his bridges.

‘My King is James, not Arthur,’ he stated calmly. ‘I will not betray him as you have me.’

Deep in the shadowy depths of the King’s helmet, leathery flesh was drawn back to manufacture a smile.

‘Mortal man: he comes … and then is gone. His word is like unto his life: mere painting on water.’

Oglethorpe leant on his horse, desperate for contact with any real, truly living, thing. He found that it was trembling. The Lieutenant Colonel was often mocked (behind his back) for soft-heartedness towards the lesser creatures of God. Even friends accused him of compassion to an almost feminine degree. Today however, his weakness stood him in good stead. Pity for the poor beast gave him fresh resolve.

‘I have read a different text,’ he said stoutly. ‘I know that my redeemer liveth.’

Again the royal head rocked, in disappointment and disbelief.

‘Hath not childhood ended yet?’ he asked. King Arthur’s reply was more in sorrow than in anger. ‘You have something of mine. I shall ask it of you again – once more: later this very day. By then you will have grounds for a wiser reply.’

Happy not to be just … swept away forthwith, Theophilus did not answer. He had done enough to merely stand his ground and save his soul.

The King looked about, taking in the frozen troopers.

‘These,’ he said, ‘might now have tales inconvenient for you. I am kind and slow to anger. They will die today.’

Before Oglethorpe could protest, Arthur swept up his arm and a beam of light detached itself from each soldier. What was sent forth departed reluctantly, torn from its shell of flesh with a scream, before rocketing up into heaven. Theophilus tried to avert his eyes but could not. He saw in every glowing shape the frightened face of its owner. The troopers’ souls were not prepared for judgement and they were afraid.

‘A new day is dawning,’ said King Arthur – and it was. Hours of Oglethorpe’s allotted span had been stolen.

The Guardsmen, who’d lost much more but did not know it, looked in puzzlement at their commander. Why was it suddenly light and why did they feel so … forlorn?

The King was gone. In his place was a distant sound of cannon and combat.

The Reverend Stephen Toogood had a spring in his step – or at least he would have had but for the quagmire beneath his boots. The Lord constantly led him into the desolate places of the Earth but he did not begrudge it. On the contrary, he hoped for eternal reward for his cheerful treading of God-forsaken places. Wading through the freezing waters of the Langmoor Rhine, he had forced himself to thank the Almighty for so putting him to the test.

The Reverend’s pious fortitude was strengthened by there being some immediate point to his travails. King Monmouth was, under God, leading them to victory. The fires of the Royal camp at Zog were now less than a mile away. But for the tramp of men and their laboured breathing, all was quiet and their progress remained secret. The Lord had blessed their unbelievable march in the dark, watching over them as he had the soldiers of Gideon. Meanwhile, the warriors of Babylon slept on, spending their last night before the everlasting flames, deep in the arms of Morpheus.

‘Dream well,’ thought the Reverend, ‘enjoy your last sinful conjectures before awakening to death!’

It felt … blessed, he had to admit, to have sword and pistol at hand: to at last stand openly in the field against the foes of God. No more covert meetings and mutterings, no more impotent gnashing of teeth at the servants of Beelzebub. Also, Pastor Toogood had his own personal grievances to join to the indictment of the Lord. He’d watched Mayor Timewell of Taunton and his helpers dance, bottles brandished, round a bonfire in the market-place, burning all the pews and pulpits and galleries of the conventicles they’d raided. Toogood’s little church had been amongst them. In total there were ten cartloads and it took them till three in the morning to finish their revels. They were very merry about it and the Anglican church bells rang all the while in glee. That was five years back but the heat on his face that night, from the fire and from within, was still with him. After that he and his flock took to the hills, like the last generation before the judgement, to skulk in churches under the ground, up in the wilds beyond Axminster. Out there, in the forlorn places of the world, in vast ditches covered by bracken, he held services by night, preaching on texts like Revelations 12: ‘And the woman fled into the wilderness where she hath a place prepared of God’.

He did no harm but Babylon would not let him be. The Devon militia raided his home and one captain placed his hand up the placket of his wife’s gown, saying ‘she has a fine bum indeed; good enough for fame in London’.

The Reverend Toogood forgave but could not forget. Monmouth’s call to insurrection fell on fertile ground and the Reverend’s flock joined with him, in war as in prayer, marching along as one unit. It was against all hope, and certain proof of Divine favour, that there should arise a true Protestant paladin to lead them on crusade. It would have been a sin indeed not to respond with fervour. Now, this very day they would work the Lord’s will and quench their own anger meanwhile.

The password of the hour was ‘So-ho!’ – the traditional cry of the chase – and, by chance, the site of the Duke’s London residence. Toogood had never been a hunting man but tonight he yearned to yell Soho! like any blood-crazed squire. His hand moved to the fine pistol at his side. It had done good work in Cromwell’s time, smiting the Amalekites hip and brow, and would do so again.

Out in the darkness, where Lord Grey’s rebel cavalry and Wade’s Red Regiment were presumed to be, a single shot rang out.

Anton Buyse, ‘the Brandenburger’, did not have any great hopes of the day. This present commission with the Duke represented something of a dip in career terms. He who had the honour of directing artillery for the Kings of Christendom (and certain mussulman Lords, although that section of his c.v. was less advertised) was now reduced to trundling three childrens’ toys through the night. He sought distraction from present discomforts by thinking of what he would really like to have, given free choice, for the coming battle.

This was, of course, only a minor ale-house punch-up by civilised European standards so Buyse moderated his shopping list accordingly. It would be nice to have a brace of demi-cannon for a preliminary, long-range duel with the opposing artillery. Pitting one’s skill, one to one, guns against guns, against the other Master of the Ordnance, raised mere combat to the art form it ought to be. Sadly, their night-march to surprise the enemy precluded such sophisticated pleasures. Similarly, a restrained number of culverins would have supplied the sheer … punch essential for the drama of tearing spaces in serried ranks of infantry. Again, ‘King’ Monmouth’s purse did not run to what any petty Rhineland princeling would regard as essentials.

Buyse looked at the reality being hauled in front of him by these enthusiastic but amateur English. So much for fond wishes! A year back, if anyone told him he’d be commanding the grand total of three drakes, (there’d been four but one had a squeaky wheel and was, needs must, left behind tonight), he would have laughed in their face – or maybe killed them. They were mere five-pounders, the sort of thing you gave apprentices to tinker at; something they could do no harm with.

Anton sighed. He was glad his Dad wasn’t around to see this come-down. He never thought he’d say such a thing, but it was a good job that fluke-ish Croat saker took his head off when it did. ‘Never get involved in a job’, that’s what he’s always said. ‘Ideals are good servants but bad masters’. The old boy had been right. It wasn’t as though he cared about ‘Protestantism’, whatever that might be. No, he might as well admit it, Monmouth had charmed him and he’d let himself be charmed. So that was that. Anton Buyse had accepted a contract and no Buyse ever bowed out of a job: there was the good name of the family business to consider.

He tightened his grip on his quadrant, a Buyse heirloom handed down to him. Supposedly it had seen service when Constantinople fell and the first Buyse set match to touch-hole. Since then it was like a talisman to them. Father handed it to son when their eyes grew too dim (or practised) to need it.

‘Sorry Dad,’ said the Brandenburger in silent prayer. ‘I’ll make amends by a really good job. I’ve brought along some of that hail-shot you designed.’

He wasn’t worried about the day to come. Cannons returned the love his family gave and they never called any member home until his time was done.

Alongside, Anton heard his assistant, John Rose, whispering the artilleryman’s litany, touchingly desperate that he should acquit himself well on his first outing. Buyse, who’d learnt the words in his cradle, smiled and joined in:

‘Put back your piece, order your piece to load, search your piece, sponge your piece, fill your ladle, put in your powder, empty your ladle, put home your powder, thrust home your wad, regard your shot, put home your shot gently, thrust home your last wad with three strokes, gauge your piece, discharge your piece … put back your piece …’

It warmed Anton’s heart to hear those childhood words and observe another introduced to the joys of ordnance. He thought of the son he’d not yet had and the Buyses going ever on and on to better days and bigger guns.

‘It applies to wenches too,’ he softly confided to his pupil. Somewhere ahead a musket was fired.

Piercy Kirke, late-Governor of the Tangier garrison, now Colonel of the Queen Dowager’s Regiment, slammed his fist upon the table.

‘Well, God damn me, but you’re poor entertainment! If Monmouth’s rabble refuse to turn and fight us then I demand to be amused. What d’ye think I woke you up for? Take the poker out your arse and answer a soldier of the Crown. Come on, it’s a plain enough question!’

The Reverend Thomas Peratt, Vicar of St. Mary’s, Westonzoyland, ignored the table-top earthquake and continued his unwanted supper as best he could. It seemed a strange and perverse world where the forces of order were as much to be feared as rebels.

‘It is not a subject on which I venture to have an opinion – nor wish discussed in my house,’ he said quietly. ‘And whilst you are billeted here I would ask that you abide by …’

‘“No opinion”?’ roared the Colonel. ‘Don’t give me that. You’re a man made of flesh the same as me. So do tell: what’s your favourite: pure-and-simple or arsey-versey?’

Peratt flushed as pink as the mutton he ate.

‘Colonel, kindly consider my wife and daughters who are also under this roof …’

The deeply-tanned soldier was momentarily thrown and set aside his clay churchwarden pipe. ‘God’s teeth and bowels, man!’ he exclaimed, puzzlement distorting an already weathered brow. ‘Who else d’ye think made me ponder such matters?’

An alternative use for his cutlery occurred to the Reverend, until he recalled the sixth commandment – and the royal soldiers posted outside his vicarage. Meanwhile, Colonel Kirke rampaged on.

‘I will have a response of you, God-botherer. Doesn’t your big black book tell you what to say?’

Exasperation gave Peratt the courage to lift his gaze. He realised that he’d never seen anything as capable of … anything as this red-coated demon.

‘Assuming that you refer to the Holy Bible,’ he said, losing the battle of stares, ‘I recall that Romans, 1, 26, prohibits loathsome acts against nature such as you refer to. Likewise …’

Kirke downed an enormous draught of the Vicar’s cider and wiped his thin lips on the scarlet and gold of his cuff.

‘Cut the cant,’ he said angrily. ‘I care as little for your text as your company. Chapter two of the equally “Holy” Koran, which the Shareef of Fez was gracious enough to show me, says “women are your fields: go, then, into your fields as you please”. Put that in your pipe and smoke it!’

From outside there was a torrent of inventive invective and the sound of blows. The door opened with a crash and the Bishop of Winchester entered.

‘Kirke,’ he barked, ‘your soldiers are as soft as shit and twice as nasty. “Don’t interrupt our Colonel at his dinner” indeed! Tell ’em to keep out of my way.’

Both Colonel Piercy and the Vicar stood and bowed to the Right Reverend Dr Peter Mews, who growled at the greeting and crossed over to the dining table. Liberating a mutton chop from the heaped platter, he lowered his bulk on to a convenient stool.

‘Couldn’t sleep,’ he said, in-between savaging the meat and serving himself from the cider flagon. ‘Too excited. What were you talking about? The battle to come?’

The Bishop had never really ceased to be a soldier after his lively time in the late Civil War, suffering thirty wounds in the service of Charles, King and Martyr. He carried tokens of his pains in the form of spectacular scars over the left hemisphere of his face. The black silk covering for same in turn bestowed on him his universal nickname: ‘Old Patch’.

For a while, amidst the harrowing of England, he’d been the very epitome of death-on-legs. Then, fortunately for his immortal soul, capture (whilst unconscious, naturally) at Naseby field gave pause for reflection. Upon release, and to general amazement, he entered the Church. The leopard changed its spots – if not its diet … Monmouth’s invasion had drawn him west, under the pretence of safeguarding nearby Episcopal estates, like a shark to a spray of blood.

With the arrival of such powerful reinforcements, and in Kirke’s present abashment, Peratt saw the opportunity for revenge.

‘Actually,’ he said sweetly, ‘the Colonel was expounding on his great attraction to the Koran and the Mussulman religion …’

The old Bishop turned his brick-red face on the soldier, the watery eyes therein looking very uncharitable. He’d already had a day of it. At dinner with General Feversham some braggart cavalier – Oggyton … Oglethorne or something – had contested his spiritual authority, admitting Winchester’s rule over some place called Godalming but claiming ancient exception for his manor there, and thus allegiance to the Deans of Salisbury instead. Down here it was uncheckable: possibly true but a bloody cheek nevertheless.

‘You don’t say?’ he rumbled, crunching the chop bone between his teeth. ‘I wonder in that case he doesn’t convert. It’s been a while since we’ve burnt an apostate.’

Colonel Kirke was shameless.

‘Tis possible,’ he said. ‘Religion plays but a small part in my life. However, the King of Morocco had my promise that should I ever change faith, I would embrace Islam. The oath at least saves me from King James’s constant promptings to Popery.’

Old Patch’s drinking noises turned to bubbling as he misswallowed.

‘In fact,’ Kirke continued, smooth and sharp as a viper, ‘your arrival forestalled a most interesting conversation. Assuming the Vicar, of all people, should know, I’d asked him what this life business is about – and do you know, he couldn’t tell me!’

The Reverend moved to protest but the Bishop waved him to silence.

Old Patch had a special tone of voice, well known to those under the regime of fear at his Farnham Castle seat, which sounded like sweet reason but betokened an eruption to come. He sometimes employed it in sermons and thereby caused many a hardened sinner’s knees to knock.

‘Well,’ he said, smiling and showing off his brown peg teeth, ‘pray let me enlighten you. The sole purpose of this fleeting life is the worship of its Creator.’

Colonel Kirke looked into the middle distance – about three yards in the context of Westonzoyland Vicarage.

‘Worship, you say? Well, I’ll give it a whirl. Let me see … Almighty God, I worship you; I give you thanks, I adore you, I prostrate myself before your invisible feet, I sing your praises, You are Almighty …’

A heavily pregnant – say about nine and a half months – pause hung in the smoky air.

‘No,’ said the Colonel conclusively. ‘Thanks all the same. It doesn’t do much for me.’

The Bishop levered himself up, toppling the stool backwards. In youth he’d fought for the blessed Charles, King and Martyr – or anyone else who’d have him – and even now, in autumn years, a relish for combat remained. A be-ringed Episcopal finger was levelled inches from Kirke’s smiling face.

Old Patch’s Armageddon of abuse was postponed by the sound of musketry from Zog.

Louis Duras, naturalised Frenchman, nephew of the great Marshal Turenne and now Earl of Feversham, Commander of his Majesty’s forces in the West, had some black looks for Lieutenant Colonel Oglethorpe when the Blues thundered back into camp at three-thirty. By then light shone in the east and – though far from resolved – battle was well under way. The surprised redcoat line was being luxuriantly bathed in the warm attentions of Monmouth’s guns. Being nearest, Dumbarton’s regiment of Scotsmen, once the Duke’s own, were in particular benefiting from Anton Buyse’s expertise and falling in neat swathes. Theophilus was painfully aware that at a quarter to one that morning – shortly before to him but long hours ago to everyone else – he had sent word that all was quiet. The Earl, wig askew and compelled to breakfast on horseback, was not pleased.

Seven years back, whilst blasting fire-gaps in Temple Lane, London, to contain yet another major conflagration, his then-commander, the Duke of Monmouth, got over-generous with the powder. A flying beam so stove Feversham’s head in that his life was despaired of. However, to the surprise of all and the delight of some, he not only survived the ‘remedy’ of trepanning, but did so with faculties intact. Rising like Lazarus, he was found to be complete – except in one tiny respect. Ever after he was the very devil to rouse from . . .