Rebels and traitors

Chapter Fourteen — Oxford: 1642-43

Juliana Lovell, still uneasy with her new name, arrived in the first month that Oxford was the King's permanent headquarters.

December was not the best time here. Low mist clung to the many country waterways. The hedgerows were dark, the sere trees gloomy of aspect. Houses on the city perimeter had been blown up for strategic reasons, leaving ugly gaps. Tentative efforts were being made to construct fortifications to replace the now-useless medieval city walls, but the hard frosted ground was resisting the tools wielded by thoroughly disgruntled citizens. This was a garrison, crammed to bursting point with soldiery and the great equipment of war. The once-pleasant, meadow-fringed River Cherwell, which formed the upper reaches of the Thames, was already oozing with pestilence as the raw sewage from impossible numbers of people mingled with dead horses and dogs that blocked the current, bobbing amidst oily bubbles under the willows that trailed their slender fingers into waters befouled by butchers' bloody rejects and fermenting horticultural garbage. Smoke from house-fires and minor industries curdled the atmosphere. A miasma of unease seeped through the cobbled streets, from the chilly castle to the Cornmarket where the lead roof had been stripped to make bullets.

Unwelcome to the townspeople, the King had ensconced himself in Christ Church College. Prince Rupert was at Magdalen. The Warden's Lodge at Merton had been earmarked for the absent Queen, should she ever arrive. The colleges sycophantically professed themselves honoured by their noble guests — except when unwanted new masters were dumped on them at royal command. In more humble areas there was frank resistance to billeting, as the domestic routine of the little people's little houses was brutally disrupted. Fear riffled through the winding backstreets. Bullying took over in the taverns. Needless to say, as stationers and booksellers braced themselves for bankruptcy, all the brewers were flourishing.

Her family had wandered about in search of trade, yet Juliana had never been in a university town before. Oxford colleges would have known quiet hours before this unending military crush but the peace of the cloisters had been lost. While the carriage Lovell had borrowed to fetch her from Wallingford forced its way through the cobbled streets, she flinched at the turmoil. Juliana saw that Lovell was excited by the bustle beyond the carriage's cloudy windows. Assuring her she would get used to the commotion, he rattled off a commentary: 'The perimeter defences are being thrown up by the townspeople; everyone between sixteen and sixty has to work one day a week. About one in a hundred actually turn up, of course. I shall not allow you to do it.' Juliana wondered how he would accomplish this autocratic refusal; already she guessed he would give his instructions to her, and leave her to address the authorities. 'Possibly the breastworks will never be complete, but if they are, this town will be the best defended in England so don't fret. There's a Dutchman, de Gomme, supervising the works. Supposed to be brilliant. Let us hope someone has told the herring-eating bastard we're not building dykes but battlements!'

They were now passing Christ Church, almost at their destination. 'Edmund was a scholar at this grand college?'

'Treves? No, St John's. Poxy place, never showed me much welcome, but if you say you are a cavalier's wife they may let you walk around the garden. Some colleges are quite taken over by the army, so watch yourself.'

Juliana felt perturbed. 'Soldiers are dangerous even to their own supporters?'

'Never take risks with soldiers,' replied Lovell in clipped tones. Was her husband a threat to women? Juliana dreaded to ask. 'Christ Church is where the King has found a perch, though its great quadrangle is being used to pasture oxen and sheep.'

'Why?'

Lovell stared at her, and she saw her mistake, one merely caused by inexperience, though he must think her stupid. 'Food, girl!' As Juliana shuddered at what it would mean to be trapped in a city under siege, Lovell continued his review undaunted: 'Gloucester Hall is being used for sword manufacture, there's another grinding-mill out at Wolvercote, gunpowder at Osney. New College holds the armoury and magazine. Magdalen Bridge has been converted into a drawbridge — you saw that — ' Its significance had been lost on her. 'If the enemy come — when they come, I dare say — we can rattle it up cheerily. Magdalen Tower is a lookout and there are great guns in the grove. Their range is a mile and a half. All the schools are being turned over to warehouses for staples — cloth, cheese, coal and corn. It's out with dreamy scholars and in with tailors stitching uniforms…'

Listening, Juliana wondered if all the King's soldiers were this much aware of logistics; she suspected there would be many who merely took orders. Lovell was a complete professional; she was beginning to see how deeply he cared to be efficient and informed. He had made this his world. All over the country men like him who had served on the Continent would be bringing such expertise to bear, on both sides; it boded a long conflict. Orlando Lovell and others like him, who had had no future without a war to fight, were now digging in almost with enjoyment. He was eager to use his talent for organisation — and, presumably, his talents also for death and destruction.

I should have asked, thought Juliana, what his plans are when the civil war is ended. Will he return to fighting on the Continent? Shall I have to go with him, or be left here alone? She convinced herself that his marriage meant Lovell wished to settle to domestic life in England. He had, after all, spoken of mending matters with his family.

There were more pressing anxieties: 'Will you be paid by the King, sir?'

'When there is cash for the purpose. The order has gone out for metal to be brought in. We've taken down church bells for it, and the dear citizens are supposed to hand over their brass kitchenware — ' How fortunate that we ourselves have none, Juliana thought. 'The Mint is coming down from Shrewsbury to produce coins, which will be made out of melted college plate — when the colleges can be pricked into collaborating.'

"Pricked"? You mean, compelled to surrender their valuables?'

'The sneaky masters and fellows try to dodge, but His Majesty has quickly learned to be a beggar. He hardens his heart. St John's offered eight hundred pounds instead of its treasure. Charles thanked them heartily for the money — then took their precious plate as well. The county and the university must pay up over a thousand pounds a week for the upkeep of our cavalry — mind, most of the cash will be for bullets and hay for the horses.'

'So you will be paid, then.' Juliana was still doggedly worrying about rent, food and fuel.

The carriage had stopped, in a winding backstreet, but Lovell, caught up in his discourse, made no move. He gave his wife a wry look. 'One way or another, we'll be paid; depend on it!'

'How, "one way or another"? You cannot mean plunder?'

'A fact of war,' Lovell informed her.

Fortunately he then noticed they had arrived at their lodgings.

'All the allure of a rat-catcher's coat pocket,' Lovell admitted, as his young bride gazed around this depressing room that was to be their first married home. He helped the coachman deposit her great coffer alongside what must be his own campaign chest.

Juliana had seen worse — and she had seen her grandmother briskly refuse it. They had an upstairs chamber barely ten feet square, with a sagging mattress on a lop-sided bed behind stained and moth-eaten green curtains, a couple of spine-breaking bolt-upright chairs — not matching — and a pot-cupboard which, through one door with a broken hinge, was sending messages that the chamberpot had needed emptying for a fortnight. The stairs came up from the ground floor directly into their room, opposite the empty fireplace, then a narrower flight turned on up into the garret, whose occupants must trip to and fro via the Lovells' accommodation. Directly opposite the stairs she spotted a large mousehole in the wainscot.

She drew a deep, despondent breath and nearly choked on the malodorous air she had swallowed. 'Ah! Dearest, I was hoping for a sunlit closet where I could dry rose-petals and cook up lavender pastilles in a little brass pannikin!'

'Bear up, wife. I thought I had chosen someone more stalwart.' Lovell fielded her brave jest with the robust manner of a cavalier, though he sounded apologetic.

'Oh you will find me apt for the purpose,' Juliana assured him, though bitterness escaped in her voice. Lovell could not read just how grim her disappointment was, but he sensed hard times in the past. For him that was good. He was relying on the girl's resilience. A dainty maid, inexperienced, would be an encumbrance to him; even so, he felt sorry for Juliana's sad air of defeat.

Alerted by some stillness, Juliana looked at her husband. He held her under the chin. 'I hope you are not feeling betrayed. This is war; this is how it must be. At least,' he said, as if it did matter to him, 'we shall have our companionship.'

So Juliana smiled.

She could dispose of the chamberpot's half-gallon of stinking walnut-tinted urine. While she was pouring strangers' leavings into a gutter in the street, she encountered their landlord, a thin, sneering glove-maker with a bald head showing white through strands of greasy hair. Juliana greeted him politely but firmly; she was unconsciously mimicking her grandmother, who had been quick to despise others but knew when to conceal it. She begged him to provide a small table. He assured her she and Lovell were to 'table' with him, meaning he would provide a meal for them once a day; relieved to know they would have hot food, however indifferently cooked, Juliana insisted on having their own table even so, to do needlework.

She was making progress. She scrubbed, beat the mattress, tidied, made the window-catch work, sorted the rings that held up the bed-canopy. Lovell watched and approved. However, the mice always knew they had the mastery of her. They came out and warmed themselves whenever a small fire was in the grate.

'If we employ a servant he or she will have to sleep here, in our room.'

'So let us not have a servant yet!' Lovell chortled. 'I want no drip-nosed bootboy nor podgy maid listening from behind the bed-curtains when I come at your commodity'

He was more fastidious than many. All over the country, servants in shared bedrooms overheard their employers' lovemaking. Juliana was glad Lovell wanted privacy. Besides, they could not afford servants. Nor would their financial situation improve, she now knew. Almost offhandedly Lovell informed her, 'By the by. There was a mistake about the business with my brother. The wagon of powder that exploded at Edgehill was not on the Parliamentarian side. Ralph lives yet.'

'You must be rejoicing,' replied Juliana. His careless manner gave her the first hint that Lovell had always known the true facts. Shocked, she kept her anger hidden. Lovell shrugged and turned away quickly, unwilling to be quizzed. She wondered what Mr Gadd would say to this — then found herself hoping that he never heard of it. She had chosen her life. She would have to cope.

So now she was a wife. She had become loyal to her husband, protecting his reputation whatever he did, even when she suspected him of deliberate deceit.

They settled into a routine. Lovell was frequently out by day, but he returned for dinner every night. He had a streak of frugality; he rarely wasted funds on carousing. By day Juliana was lonely, but she could be content with her own company. When she did complain of her solitude, Lovell took her to view the King inspecting artillery in Magdalen Grove. The next time, they went to see the King playing tennis with Prince Rupert. Once, they watched the young Prince of Wales practise riding tricks.

That was about the limit of spectacles on offer, unless Juliana wished to be an observer when Parliament's negotiators argued for peace politely and pointlessly with the King and his circle in Christ Church quadrangle. 'Far too exciting, Orlando. I must be excused lest I disgrace myself with some hysterical outcry.' She was assured that prospects for entertainment would improve when the Queen arrived from Holland. Henrietta Maria had, after all, known her grandmother.

'It is unlikely Her Majesty will remember Grand-mere.' Juliana gave Lovell a straight look. She could gloss over invented history as blandly as he did. Soon she did it every quarter, as her husband asked when the rents from her apple orchards might arrive and she played dumb.

When they were discussing the peace commission she had called her husband by his first name. Orlando accepted this without comment. By now he called Juliana 'my sweet', which was conventional but he made it sound genuine. They were conducting their marriage with respect and affection.

Christmas was drear, though they did manage to obtain a presence at Christ Church where the King entertained in great splendour on Christmas Day. This dinner was hot, smoky and crowded, the musicians inaudible over the noise of the people, the service slow and the food cold by the time it reached them at the far end of the table.

By early February the Queen was known to have left Holland, with supplies and several thousand professional soldiers. She landed at Bridlington, which the Earl of Newcastle, a great Royalist commander in the north, made as safe as possible for her reception. Not safe enough. Parliamentarian ships bombarded the house where she first lodged. Her Majesty accepted all with great spirit; when she was forced to take shelter outside in a ditch, Henrietta went back into the house for a lapdog that her fleeing maids-of-honour had left behind. This was widely seen as bravery. 'Damned stupid!' snarled Orlando Lovell. Juliana concurred.

The northern Parliamentarian army, commanded by Sir Thomas Fairfax, lay between the Queen and Oxford. The King was anxious to have Henrietta Maria with him, but conscious that if she were to fall into rebel hands she would become a fatal pawn. He was too devoted to risk it. For several weeks the Queen stayed with the Earl of Newcastle, revelling in her own courage and initiative, and dabbling merrily. Eventually a plan was hatched for Prince Rupert to advance from Oxford through the Midlands so he could clear a safe passage for his indomitable aunt. On the 29th of March, with Orlando Lovell among his retinue, the prince set out, planning to relieve the siege of Lichfield, and to secure a route for the Queen through Warwickshire. This would entail removing the threat posed by the rebel town of Birmingham. Not only were its fractious cutlers supplying arms to Parliament, they had set about strangers and imprisoned them on suspicion of being Royalists. King's messengers had been captured as spies too. Birmingham would have to be crushed. Lovell gave the impression the Oxford Royalists were looking forward to it.

This was a new spring offensive and obviously more important than anything Juliana had seen before. Lovell emptied his battered chest of a back-and-breastplate which he spent hours buffing. Their room stank with the reek of neat's-foot oil as he softened straps, belt and riding boots. A man she had never seen before, who seemed to be one of his soldiers, brought pistol bullets, dumping the heavy bag on her little work table with a dead thud that terrified her. Juliana sat nursing Lovell's rapier, a European blade with a cup hilt and a pommel encrusted with very worn silver. He was not its first owner, though he never told its history. Tired of the sick-looking thin feather in his beaver, Juliana had made him a new hatband from a piece of the peacock satin that had been left over when she cut out the bodice of her wedding-dress. Although he seemed to have no awareness that she had made the dress herself, Lovell appeared oddly touched by her ministrations to his hat.

'My will is in the chest. Your man Gadd insisted — you inherit everything, sweetest — though since I am worth nothing, spending the cash won't trouble you long. If I die, the first thing you'll need to do is sell my wedding suit. Then I'd advise you to remarry — take Treves; he's still writing poetry to the celestial bow of your eyebrow.' Lovell paused in the boisterous tirade. 'You'll think of me kindly, I hope.'

Men need to be loved. Juliana no longer had to rely on her grandmother for this motto; she could be cynical herself. 'Always, Orlando. May my devoted thoughts comfort you.'

He was a true cavalier. Every cavalier needed a woman to adore. Well, a woman to adore him.

Orlando strained Juliana to him, kissing her hard and making the embrace lascivious. She found herself memorising the faint scent of his tobacco, the rasp of his moustache against her cheek, the softness of his lips. Unexpectedly, tears tumbled down her cheeks. They gazed into each other's eyes, his chestnut brown, hers grey. They were bound to one another now; if it was not by love, it would pass as a near thing.

Juliana watched Prince Rupert's men ride out from Oxford by the North Gate. Try as she might, she failed to spot her husband in their midst. She knew that Edmund Treves was beside him, all jealousy forgotten. The young Prince Rupert rode at the head of the column, flourishing his commander's baton, handsome, confident and exquisitely dressed, with his favourite white poodle, Boy, looking around proudly from the saddle. A group of aristocratic officers accompanied the prince, all on excellent horses. Juliana guessed she had missed her husband because he must be closer to the prince in the cavalcade than she expected; he had bluffed his way forward. His boldness would not come amiss; Orlando Lovell would live up to any position, however deviously he acquired it.

The cavalry swept by in a continuous rattle of hoofbeats, with helmets and feathered hats bobbing, and colours flying impressively. Juliana could see there was a pattern to the pennants and tasselled flags that marked each officer and company, though she could not decipher it. Easier to distinguish were the foot regiments in their distinctive coloured coats of white, green, red, purple and blue, marching in blocks. Several cannon were dragged in the train, pulled by strings of heavy horses. Drums were beaten to time the march of the baggy-britches footmen, with their long muskets and even longer pikes. Many wore red sashes, the colours of the King.

Juliana was not fooled by the glamorous panoply. These glorious-looking companies streaming out of Oxford were ruthless raiders. They would seize anything they could from the country they passed through, to provide for themselves and to prevent the enemy's use of it, and she knew their intent was murderous. Though they fought for King Charles, many were foreigners, straightforward mercenaries. Even among the Englishmen were scarred veterans of the terrible wars on the Continent, whose cruel manners and methods Lovell had described to her. The lower ranks of armies on both sides of the conflict had been called loiterers and lewd livers, plucked from prisons, almshouses and inns, enticed into uniform with the crude lure of occasional pay and plentiful loot. Still, the cavalcade looked brave, bonny and businesslike; it took so long to pass that she grew chilled in the fresh March air.

When she returned to their lodging, she wept inconsolably. She had never been so totally alone. She had no idea how long she would have to wait in Oxford before the troops returned, what dangers Orlando would have to face while they were away, or what would happen to her if he never came back. By now, certain signs began to suggest to her that she was carrying a child. It was too early to have mentioned this to her husband, and she had been so wary of his reaction she would not attempt it in the bustle of his departure. He had left her three shillings. Otherwise, she was friendless and penniless.

So Juliana sat alone, watching motes drift by the window and listening to the stillness of their room. She wanted her husband to survive. Yet she understood clearly that even if he did, their life together would never be as she had hoped. For her, today might just be the beginning of many long periods of abandonment. If Lovell was wounded, captured or killed, her fate would be even worse.