James paused, wanting to believe that his part in this had been so unimportant, that all along a conspirator with a great name, or a man with a great fortune, or the French ambassador or the Prince of Wales himself had been meeting with the judges, or with Oliver Cromwell, and an arrangement had been made for the king’s safety. Perhaps even now a secret door in Whitehall Palace was being opened to the stairs down to the river and a ship was raising her sails and taking him away.
I truly believe that they intend to execute him within days. Of course, I beg that you save him and prevent this terrible martyrdom. Send me orders as to what I can do. Tell me at least that you have received this?
TIDELANDS, FEBRUARY 1649
The iron bar clanged loudly on the horseshoe and Alys rose up from the breakfast table, wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, and went to the door. The cold wintry air swirled in as she banged the door behind her. “Lord, is that you, Uncle Ned?” Alinor heard her call. “I thought you’d never come home!”
Alinor threw open the front door to look out, shading her eyes against the bright wintry sun that burned low, just rising over the harbor. Against the white brightness she could only see the outline of a man, pack on his back, hat on his head, soldier’s boots, but she recognized her brother as he stepped down into the ferry, kissed his niece, and let her haul him over, solemnly paying her his fee.
“You’re welcome to your home, Brother,” Alinor said as Ned stepped ashore. She moved into the warm hug of his cape. He smelled of London, of strange stables, of damp beds, of beer rather than ale, fires of charcoal, not wood. “You’ve been gone so long. We’ve had no news. What happened? Did they finish the trial? We only heard that it had begun.”
“Aye, they did,” he replied, sitting down on his stool and pulling off his boots.
“Never!” Alys exclaimed. “I swore they would not dare.”
“They dared do more than that,” Ned said wonderingly. “All the way home, I’ve been puzzling about it. But they did more than charge him with betrayal, they accused him of treason, with a death sentence. And it’s done. He’s dead and we are a kingdom without a king.”
Alinor gasped and put her hand to the base of her throat and felt her pulse thud. “Really? Truly? He’s dead? The king is dead?”
“Yes. You’re like everyone else that I’ve told, all the way down the London road. Everyone acts like it was a shock, but he was on trial before a court, in full sight of the people, and he had it coming since Nottingham. Why should anyone be surprised that time ran out for him?”
“Because he’s the king,” Alinor said simply.
“But not above the law, as it turns out, as he thought.”
“How did they do it?” Alys asked curiously.
Alinor went to the foot of the staircase and shouted for Rob to wake and come down, for his uncle was home, poured her brother a cup of ale and sat beside him. She could hardly bear to listen, knowing what this would mean for James. But she had to know: a kingdom without a king was a puzzle that the people of England would have to solve. And how would a people as diverse as the minister, or Mrs. Wheatley, or the Chichester apothecary agree as to how they should be governed? Or would it all be decided by the likes of Sir William and nothing really changed at all?
“They did it lawfully,” Ned answered his niece. “In a court of law, though he denied it to the last.”
“I mean the execution? We knew that he was on trial. But nobody thought he would be executed. We had sight of a news-sheet after the first day, and then nothing.”
He sighed. “I was glad to see it done, and it had to be done, and it was just that it was done. But, Lord knows, it’s always pitiful to see a man die.”
Rob, tying the laces on his breeches, came downstairs, shook hands with his uncle, and sat at the table to listen.
“Where’s Red?” Ned suddenly asked, looking under the table, sensing an absence where his dog should be.
Alinor put her hand on his. “I’m sorry, Ned,” she said. “He died. He was in no pain. He was just very tired one morning, and by evening, he was asleep.”
He shook his head a little. “Ah,” he said. “My dog.”
They were silent for a moment, and Alinor cut Ned a slice from the breakfast loaf and put it on a wooden platter before him.
“What about the king?” Rob prompted.
“They beheaded him?” Alys pressed.
“They beheaded him. Quickly and well, on a cold morning. He stepped out of a window of glass so tall and so wide that it was like a door to his palace of Whitehall. So he was never in a cell, though they found him guilty. He was never chained, though they named him a criminal. He spoke for a little while, but nobody could hear him—there were thousands of us there, crowded in the street—and then he laid himself down and the executioner took his head off. One blow. It was well done. He did not give the executioner pardon, which was sour. He said he was a ‘martyr to the people.’ I heard that much: the idiot.” Ned coughed and spat into the fire. “He died with a lie in his mouth, as was fitting. It was us who were a martyr to him. He lied to the very end.”
“God forgive him,” Alinor whispered.
“I never will,” Ned said staunchly. “And neither will any man who ever fought against him, over and over, still fighting after he had declared peace and admitted he was beat. Over and over. Never forget it.”
“God forgive him,” Alinor repeated.
“So what happens now, Uncle?” Rob asked. “Will everything change for us all?”
“That’s the question,” Ned said. “Everything has changed, everything must change. But will it? And how?”
LONDON, FEBRUARY 1649
James waited a day and a night in case there were instructions for him, but when he heard nothing from either Paris or The Hague, from his spymaster, his professor, or his father, he concluded that his work was done and there was nothing more for him to do. Sourly, he thought that there had never been anything for him to do, except to bury the king and there were others to do that. Bitterly, he thought that someone might have told him at least that they had received the letters and that they were grateful for his service; but then he remembered his mother telling him that the king was a fool and the prince a rogue and royal service was a thankless task—but one that could not be avoided.
He walked through the silent city, which was like a town in mourning, like a family in shock. He took a ferry to the south side of the river, hired a horse in Lambeth, and headed down the long road to Chichester, and to Sealsea Island.
The horse was old and weary of the road, and James was happy to go at a shambling walk. He was glad to take time away from the terror of these unpredictable days, when words would not save the king, and words could not be spoken, and think in silence what his future might be, what his life might be in this new world into which all Englishmen had stumbled. He would be a man of words no more. He knew that everything had changed for him. Everything had changed from that day at Newport, when the king had refused to come away though there was a boat waiting for him and his son’s fleet at sea.
James pulled himself back from the daydream of a victory, a comforting reverie in days of defeat. He feared that dreaming would keep the royalists trapped in exile, forever hoping for better times, forever hashing over old mistakes. Instead, he tried to think what this new England might mean for him, for his parents, and for Alinor. He doubted that his parents would stay at the court of the queen now that she would never receive a message from her triumphant husband, now that she would never return home in victory. He doubted that they would transfer their loyalty to Prince Charles, who might call himself Charles II—though it was hard to see how he would ever be crowned in Westminster Abbey, so near to Westminster Hall where his father had been sentenced to death. Surely, England must be without a king forever. Would James’s parents know they were defeated? Would they come home instead of dreaming and hoping? James thought that they would. People who had sworn loyalty and risked their lives and fortunes for the king would not necessarily transfer their faith to his son, especially a man with nothing but the fading charm of a prince in exile, surrounded by favorites, corrupt advisors, and reckless women, scattering empty promises that he was certain never to repay. Now that he was king in waiting, his court would become even more desperate, even more fatalistic. Only those with hopes of nothing better would support him. Only the homeless would be fellow travelers.