Indeed, no matter that the faded denim shirt was chastely buttoned to the neck—by some unjust alchemy that seemed to emphasise what it was intended to conceal—he found himself now looking directly at her chest.
Damnation!
He tried again. One quick look at her
"The Double R Society?"
And then away from her altogether. Anywhere.
"In one word . . ." If she had observed the first glance she gave no sign of at. Probably she was used to men with eyes like organ-stops, poor girl. "In a word— weird."
"Weird . . . meaning?"
She shook her head. "It's not easy to explain. There are a number of these Civil War groups . . . the Sealed Knot was the first one. Then there's the King's Army and the Roundhead Association, who operate together. They all do pretty much the same thing—mock-battles for charity dummy5
mostly. Charity and the fun of it, that's how it seemed to me at first ..."
"On the actual battlefields always?"
"For choice. They will put on a show anywhere, of course. But they prefer authentic locations. They like to get as close to the real thing as possible."
Weird. He had to make allowance for her prejudice against military history—and against war itself. Weird or not, these Civil War buffs would start out with two strikes against them so far as Frances Fitzgibbon was concerned.
"And they do it for the fun of it, obviously. Dressing up and all that?"
"That's what I thought at first." Frances frowned. "But there's more to it than that ... I don't know about the other groups, but with the Double R Society it's rather more complicated.
They stage the battles for charity like the others, with thousands of people watching. And the battles are combined with seventeenth-century fairs and plays and concerts—also like the others. But they don't actually do all this for the spectators and the audiences—if nobody turned up they'd do it just the same. They do it for themselves, if you see what I mean. It's not a game or a hobby, it's almost an obsession.
And in a strange way it's even more than that . . . not just obsession. There's almost an element of possession."
"You mean—they don't just play at being Royalists and Roundheads? They are Royalists and Roundheads?"
dummy5
"I think that's what I mean ..." She nodded doubtfully. "But I still don't really understand what makes them tick."
"There's a lot of esprit de corps in the different regiments, that's for sure," agreed Mitchell. "They have their own badges and they're proud of them."
"Oh, no—it's more than that, Paul. The other Civil War groups have that too."
"I don't just mean that." Mitchell caught Audley's eye.
"They're also extremely knowledgeable. And they won't let you join just to have a punch-up in costume; you have to know your history pretty damn well first."
"You're both in the process of joining, I gather?" Audley looked from one to the other.
"That's right—in fact we've both just joined. Young Frances there is a brand new Angel of Mercy for God and Parliament
—" Mitchell pointed and then tapped his own chest "—and I'm one of King Charles's laughing cavaliers."
"A Malignant," murmured Frances.
"A Malignant. And a profane and licentious limb of Satan—
that is, if I can find a horse in time for Saturday." Mitchell smiled boyishly at Audley. "That was the chief reason they let me in so quickly. There's a waiting list for the pikemen and musketeers, so they vet them much more carefully. But they're dead short of people willing to supply their own horses. Once I showed my heart was in the right place and I had a horse, I was in." The smile broadened to a wicked dummy5
cavalier grin. "Whereas they're always on the lookout for good-looking Angels of Mercy, I suspect. . . . Though I must say, Frances, you're going to have quite a problem looking like a modest Puritan maiden. You haven't got the figure for the job."
"Fiddlesticks!" Frances turned towards Audley. "But Paul's right about having to have one's heart in the right place. You can't join the Roundhead Wing or the Royalist Wing unless you believe in the appropriate politics.''
Audley nodded. "Naturally. I'd expect the Royalists to believe in the monarchy, and the Roundheads to believe in Parliament."
Frances shook her head. "It goes much further than that.
They asked me which party I'd voted for in the last General Election."
"They?"
'There's a membership committee which meets once a month to interview applicants. We were lucky to get a hearing so quickly—it's quite a complicated procedure, really."
"You can say that again," agreed Mitchell. "They've even got a form to fill in—with spaces on it for religion and politics, and God knows what else."
"So what did you tell them?"
Mitchell laughed. "I told 'em what I thought they wanted to hear: that I was a good Tory and a practising member of the Church of England. And that I thought socialism was as bad dummy5
as communism—they liked that almost as much as when I said I had my own horse."
Audley looked at Frances.
And at Frances's bosom.
Damnation again!
"I had a different committee," said Frances. "And I told them I was a paid-up member of the Labour Party. Which happens to be true."
"I asked my lot what they would have done if I said I was a Marxist-Trotskyite," said Mitchell.
"And?" Audley felt the sun hot on his face.
"There was one chap with a sense of humour. He fell around as though I was pulling his leg—as though the idea of anyone being a Trotskyite was a joke. But the other one next to him took it seriously, like I'd said something dirty. And he said that Anabaptists and Fifth Monarchy men and Levellers all went into the Parliamentary Wing."
So that was the way of it, thought Audley. Or it looked very much as though it could be the way of it. And if it was—
"I think your policemen have arrived." Frances pointed down the hillside towards the Swine Brook.
"I left my field-glasses on the monument," said Mitchell.
"One look through them and we can be sure."
Audley followed him down to the stone cross, his mind too full of possibilities to take anything else in.
dummy5
If that was the way of it ...
Mitchell adjusted the field-glasses. "That's Superintendent Weston. . . . And the sergeant."
Audley found himself looking at the inscription chiselled into the granite:
SWINE BROOK FIELD
1643
We are both upon the stage and must
act the parts that are assigned us in this tragedy; let us do it in a way of honour.
And so they must. Except if that was the way of it, then it was unlikely that there would be much room for honour.
4
“WESTON'S a sharp fellow, don't be deceived by appearances," warned Mitchell. "He goes by the book—they all do, of course—but he's got quite a reputation, according to Cox."
So Mitchell had consulted their own Special Branch superintendent, thought Audley. A very thorough young man, Mitchell ... in his place he would have done exactly the same, because Cox's memory was encyclopaedic. But it was still another score to Mitchell that he had known exactly who dummy5
to go to for first-hand information.
He stared at the memorial. It not only looked new, it was new: he could see the fragments of fresh mortar trampled into the grass around it.
He pointed. "How long has this been here? Not long?"
"A month. Wherever they do a re-enactment the Double R
people always set aside some of their profits for a memorial if there isn't one already there. It's part of their public relations," said Mitchell. "Are we going to see Weston and the sergeant now?"