Hanging Matter Read online

  “Damn bullocks!” he cried, waving a drunken fist.

  But the rider, if he heard him, didn’t bother to respond.

  CHAPTER ONE

  JAMES LUDLOW’S face creased with pain as the coach bounced over another frozen rut. The driver had little choice, attempting to increase their speed by weaving his way through the mass of fleeing refugees. In this milling crowd of exhausted humanity, men, women, and children each bore a bundle containing their meagre possessions. It was a mob which only maintained any forward motion because it was heading in one direction: away from the cannon which could be heard booming to the south. The faces of those they passed who retained sufficient energy to raise their heads said more about the horror of war than James’s expression, or his words, which seemed exaggerated in proximity to such evident hardship.

  “Damn it, Harry. If I ever complain about the discomfort of life aboard ship, you have my full permission to staple me to the deck.”

  Harry Ludlow was suffering as much of a buffeting as his brother, constantly moving his musket to ensure it didn’t accidentally go off. But having spent most of his life at sea, often in conditions that made this crowded Flemish road seem like the pathway to paradise, he was less prone to grousing. James, a more domestic creature by far, tended to be loud about his comfort, aboard ship as much as anywhere else. Pender, their servant, perched atop their sea-chests at the rear of the coach, aimed a grim smile at the back of James’s head. For him, being spared the need to walk, like the flotsam of humanity around them, served as a source of deep pleasure.

  “I should have a care, brother, lest I remember that,” said Harry, his breath forming clouds of vapour in the freezing air. “I’ve known you to complain of cramped quarters and fetid odours before we ever won our anchor.”

  James was in a foul mood, and the landscape, under the grey and threatening sky, seemed to match his temper. There was nothing in the gloomy countryside to alleviate the depressed spirit. It was flat and featureless, windswept and treeless. The roadway showed more evidence of defeat than these fleeing refugees. They’d passed several carts laden with the wounded and anyone who cared to look closely would see that many of the tattered uniforms were British. Their driver, sitting on the elevated box, used his whip again, forcing the horses to drag the coach out of yet another frozen trough. It lurched dangerously to one side, causing several people to jump clear.

  James ignored their cries of protest. He gave the coachman’s ample buttocks a sour look as he continued, shifting himself again in a vain attempt to ease his discomfort. “The privations that you sailors tolerate never cease to amaze me, brother. Even the most elevated soul aboard the ship is denied true comfort. A captain’s cabin is no drawing-room, regardless of the wiles you employ to disguise it. I’ve seen enough ships’ interiors to last me a lifetime.”

  “Then you’ll be glad to get home.”

  The element of mischief in that remark was evident by the way James frowned. But he directed the resulting ire at the coachman, not his elder brother. “All this about the French being hard on our heels is so much stuff. A canard designed to increase this villian’s fee.”

  The guns boomed out once more, as if to give the lie to James’s words. Harry, again shifting his musket slightly, looked to the south, towards the front lines. True, those cannon were a good way off, and they would represent the epicentre of any battle. But the French would have cavalry patrols out. The mob on the road were afraid of the danger, even if James was not. They’d been told the French border was teeming with an army of Jacobins, afire with revolutionary fervour, and determined to “free” their fellow sufferers to the north, the poor benighted peasants who lived in Flanders. Given the news from France, it was hardly surprising if quite a few of the locals felt the need to decline the offer.

  Having disposed of their own royal house the French were now bent on exporting the benefits of Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité to all those who shared their borders. But those high-minded sentiments included the Terror, which travelled with the guillotine as its bloody mistress. The revolutionary despots had set the whole of Europe alight. The Ludlow brothers’ route home from Genoa had been determined by that one fact, as they’d skirted a host of potential battlefields, making the trip very much longer. They were now faced with the prospect of undertaking a Channel crossing at the end of October, a notorious period in a stretch of water not renowned for gentility even in the height of summer.

  “You may very well be correct, James. The guns are miles away. But I for one shall follow the evidence of my own eyes. And what I observe looks remarkably like an army in retreat.”

  James could see as well as his brother. He too had noticed that the Allied troops they’d encountered were mainly heading north. But he was not to be deflected by that, or such reasoning. If anything the idea made him even angrier.

  “This fellow we’ve hired to drive us should be on the boards. I’ve never known such an actor.”

  As if to underscore James’s words, the driver, who’d already performed the same manoeuvre several times, turned on his box and gave James Ludlow a most fearful look. If he didn’t comprehend the meaning of the words, he could not fail to quail at the look in his irascible passenger’s eye.

  “I reckoned when he’d dunned us out of our money for this trip, a fee which I still consider exorbitant, he would dispense with the need for such melodrama. Yet here he is, still favouring me every two minutes with a terrified roll of the eyes.”

  Harry Ludlow had also been made curious by the coachman’s actions. But it was only on this occasion, by careful scrutiny, that he discovered the true reason for the man’s anxiety. Being a sailor to his fingertips, and a rougher man by far than the elegant James, he rarely managed the languid tone of voice, the air of bored indifference that his younger brother, in better mood, found so effortless. But he did so now, even going so far as to feign a yawn.

  “I would hazard that, at this moment, you frighten the poor fellow somewhat more than the French.”

  James was surprised. “In God’s name, why?”

  Harry affected another elaborate yawn, then flicked a gloved hand towards his brother’s lap. “Have you observed the direction in which your musket is pointing?”

  James looked down at the long gun on his lap. Then his eyes lifted as he followed the line of the barrel, till he found himself once more looking at the ample posterior of their coachman, straining at the leather breeches he wore.

  “I dare say,” Harry continued, “on this treacherous, uneven surface, and having to weave his way through this mob, he fears you may inadvertantly discharge your weapon.”

  Pender laughed, his teeth flashing in the grim daylight, his voice heavy with false foreboding. “You might leave him with more holes in that part of his body than he truly requires, your honour.”

  James quickly moved his musket then spun round to look at their servant, trying to maintain his angry look. But his twinkling eyes betrayed him. He was clearly amused. “A tempting thought, Pender, such a tempting thought.”

  They could no longer hear the distant cannonfire, but that did nothing to lessen the hint of panic in the air. Flushing was bulging at the seams. The little fishing port had to deal with an army landing supplies in one direction, east, while the wealthier citizens of Flanders fled west, seeking the security of the English shore. Added to this mix were the casualties, as well as a good number of soldiers who’d become separated from their units. Every hostelry, which in this sleepy backwater didn’t amount to much, was full to bursting, and the narrow streets teemed with coaches and carts, none of which could be brought to consider giving way to their fellow émigrés. The Ludlow brothers had been sat in the same spot for twenty minutes, listening to the shouts and catcalls, which were tinged with desperation, while those intent on flight tried to sort out some bottleneck further ahead. Pender had gone to investigate, returning with a glum expression on his normally cheerful face.

  “We’d be better off
walking from here, your honour. An overloaded Berlin coach has cast its wheel. Can’t see them jackin’ it up with what they has aboard, so they’ll be at that repair for an age.”

  “Right then, Pender. Light along into the town and see if there’s somewhere we can get some dinner, and fetch a couple of porters to lug our sea-chests.”

  Pender nodded, then turned and pushed his way back through the crowds that hemmed in the coach. Harry turned to James, who had been silent for some time. “I doubt that a room will be easy to come by, with the place so crowded. And if the rumours are to be believed the French could arrive at any moment. It might be better, right off, to seek out a berth aboard a ship, rather than try and spend any time here.”

  James didn’t even raise his eyes. “Do as you think fit, Harry.”

  It was all there in his demeanour. Normally James was a keen observer of all that went on around him, his painter’s eye obsessed with detail. The emotions, especially the fear in the faces of their fellow travellers, should have been a source of deep curiosity; Harry, who even without a particular destination or a pursuing army was always in a hurry, had remonstrated with him often about his dilatory ways. Not now. All the things that he had put to the back of his mind while they’d travelled from Italy had clearly returned to haunt him, and Harry shared some of the evident disappointment. He’d been given good grounds to feel that the matter had resolved itself, given the lapse of time and the distractions they’d encountered. Now, on the last leg, as they were about to take ship for England, all the reasons why James had left were crowding in on him.

  Harry spoke gently. “We can’t stay here, James. But we could go north to Amsterdam.”

  James finally raised his eyes, looking at Harry directly. Then he smiled. “No, brother. You have the right of it.” He slapped his thigh, in a most uncharacteristically hearty gesture. “Forgive me for being poor company, Harry. The prospect of getting home seems to have dried in me.”

  “Perhaps things will have resolved themselves to your advantage.”

  James replied gamely, smiling, but his eyes still told of his reluctance. “Perhaps. But first we must eat, I’m close to starving.” His eyes lit on the coachman’s back, and the man’s stoic acceptance of all that was happening ahead annoyed him, for his face clouded again. “Nearly as much as I am bored of staring at this fool’s arse.”

  “I’m glad that joining me at sea has done something for your language. I imagine your rich friends and clients will remark on how salty it seems.”

  James leant forward and touched Harry’s knee. “I have gained a great deal from being with you, brother, both on land and at sea. If I seem a little down, it’s not your doing.”

  Pender’s return, with two grubby porters, saved them both embarrassment, for though they were friends they had the good manners to avoid too much intimacy, each well aware that certain areas of their lives were not open for discussion. The driver turned as the porters took their chests off the back of the coach, his eyes holding that universal gleam of a man hoping for a reward. It would have been hard to tell what James was thinking when the fellow caught his eye, but the look was more than enough to kill any hope of extra remuneration.

  If anything, the crowds had increased. The dirt on the road had long since thawed and the pounding feet had turned it into mud. Harry and James slithered and slid in the sucking morass as they followed Pender and the porters, elbowing their way through the mass of bodies. It was with some relief that they ducked into the straw-covered courtyard of the tavern. A small urchin dashed forward with his bucket and brush, eager to clean the gentlemen’s boots for the sake of a coin. Not having the heart to dismiss him, they both stood while he sloshed around their feet, talking non-stop in a barrage of conversation that neither of them could comprehend.

  “This young fellow seems to have transferred most of the mud from my boots to the hem of my coat!” said James; yet he was grinning, and Harry was glad to observe that the pleasure was in his eyes as well as his smile. This was more like the James of old. His own coat was in a similar condition, but that did nothing to dent his generosity. The coin he gave the boy was a good deal bigger than his services, or his expertise, deserved.

  They had to duck low to enter the tavern, both coughing immediately as the warm air, laden with pipe-smoke, filled their lungs. Pender was sitting against the wall by the blazing fire, guarding their sea-chests, his coat open and his face red with the heat. He addressed them directly, without rising to his feet, his soft Hampshire burr seeming to add a feeling of welcome to their surroundings.

  “I bespoke the owner, your honours, who has enough of English to be understood, and he says that he couldn’t even find us a place in the stable.” The eyes twinkled in his red face. “We are, as you might say, worse off than Joseph and Mary.”

  An observer might have wondered at a servant addressing his master so, finding it odd that he dared to sit, let alone exercise his wit, in their presence. Yet neither of the Ludlow brothers seemed affected. For them Pender was more than a servant, if something less than an equal.

  “I’m more interested in food than a bed,” said James, opening his coat gratefully to welcome the heat of the fire.

  “That he can provide, though I reckon, being so busy, he’ll charge for it.”

  “Damn the expense,” said Harry, who was as sharp-set as his brother. “Get us a table, Pender, and tell the landlord to dig out some decent wine. And while you’re about it, tax him to see if he knows of any berths on a ship heading for Kent.”

  They were sitting in a high-backed booth talking quietly. James hacked off another piece of the tough fowl and waved it in his brother’s direction. “This bird is a Methuselan creature, judging by its texture. The cook has sought and failed to make it palatable with this rich sauce.”

  Harry stopped with the food halfway to his mouth. “I’m rather enjoying it.”

  “The cold air must have dulled your tastes, brother.”

  Harry barely heard him. He’d turned as soon as he observed the stranger approach. He knew him for a sailor right away. It was in his rolling gait, as well as the weather-beaten face. He had salt and pepper hair, worn long and loose, with two tufts high on each cheek. His clothes, though of a decent quality, were streaked with salt, and the brass buttons that lined each facing were dull and green rather than shiny bright. Harry, looking at the singular tufts of hair, had the vague impression that he had seen him somewhere before, but he couldn’t place him.

  “Mr Ludlow?” he said, looking from one to the other, his heavy eyebrows creased in confusion.

  “We are both of that name, sir,” said Harry.

  The man gave a small bow, then sniffed loudly. “Tobias Bertles, gentlemen, Captain of the Planet. She’s a snow, sir, which is a broad and comfortable class of vessel. I have had words with your man, an’ he says you are in urgent need of a crossing.”

  “That we are, Captain Bertles,” said James, quickly. He knew he’d cut Harry off, just as he knew that it would have been wise to question the word “urgent.” Moving over on his seat to give room, he pointed to the huge platter in the middle of the table. “Would you care to join us? For we have here a dish that seems to please sailors.”

  Bertles missed the sarcasm, just as he missed the fact that the remark was aimed at the brother, not him. He slid easily into the booth and gave Harry, on the other side of the table, a happy jerk of the head.

  “Why, I wouldn’t say no to a feed, sir, if there be some spare.”

  “Dig in, sir,” said James, pushing his plate towards their guest. “Though I would advise you to have a care for your teeth.”

  Bertles looked at him, perplexed, the tufts of greying hair on his ruddy cheeks twitching slightly. As he ducked his head to take a mouthful of food, he swung his brown eyes towards Harry, with a look that begged to know if he was being practised on, only to find himself under examination. His name meant nothing to Harry. But he hated the idea that he could forget a face.r />
  “My brother has refined tastes, Captain. He finds the bird is not to his liking. As to pleasing sailors, he refers to me.”

  Bertles nodded sharply, as if that information was obvious.

  “Without a ship, of course,” replied Harry.

  “I sail on the ebb, sir.”

  “Nothing could suit us better,” said James. “That is, if you have an available berth.”

  “I can offer you only my wardroom, sir, which you needs must share with me, my officers, and another passenger, for my own cabin has been given over to a married couple.”

  “Your destination in England, Captain?” asked Harry.

  Bertles looked at him directly as he replied, as if he was challenging Harry to place him. “I hail from Deal, sir. It is to there I shall return, weather permitting.”

  That smacked of remarkable good fortune, for Deal was the anchorage closest to the Ludlow house at Chillenden.

  “Then it only remains for you to name a price,” said James.

  “So you are bound for Deal!” said Bertles, smacking the table, as though he’d solved a puzzle. He sat forward slightly, evidence of some eagerness. James, who was about to reply in the affirmative, felt the gentle pressure of Harry’s foot on his own.

  “The Kent coast suits, Captain Bertles, though landing in the Downs will still leave us a journey.”

  The other man’s eyes narrowed, bringing his heavy eyebrows close to the tufts of hair on his cheeks. But the accompanying smile was knowing. Bertles was used to bargaining. “Makes no odds, Mr Ludlow, do it, for if you seek another berth you could be stranded here. If I hear things aright, Flushing ain’t going too healthy for an Englishman. An’ I dare say you’ve seen as many wounded as I.”

  “Are you transporting any of them?” asked Harry.

  “No, sir, I am not. Tobias Bertles operates for cash on the barrel, not for some slip of paper that the Horse Guards will pay out on, rock bottom, at their convenience. An’ I’m not short on passengers. There’s many a well-heeled local trying to get away from the Jacobins. Such a flood has pushed prices pretty high. Not that I’d favour a foreigner over a fellow Englishman, you understand. But I cannot be required to ask less than the going rate.”