The Two Confessions John Whitbourn (best books for students to read txt) 📖

being stubborn in blasphemy, was hung. T'wascontracted that messengers be sent back by now, but none come.

Fourteenth day of July 1702. The sentinels (who can abide no more thanhalf of one hour at the mouth of the pit) report musketry and cries from in thedeep. Colonel Cadwallon, though fetched, heard none of it for t'was shortlived.

Fifteenth day of July 1702. Nothing and no one.

Sixteenth day of July 1702. Nothing.

Seventeenth day of July 1702. Nothing.

Eighteenth day of July 1702. The Colonel ordered a Holy Mass at theentrance. Satan made no audible protest. Flaming bushels and tar-barrels werecast down and the foremost props sundered. The pit burns. Nothing.

Nineteenth day of July 1702. The pit was sealed forever.

Twentieth day of July 1702. We marched to Bideford, little loathe, butsullied and with heavy hearts. The King's orders direct us to the Kentishcoalfields where Anabaptists and Levellers....'

 

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cHAPTER 26

‘I've suddenly realised,’said Mott, abruptly all charm and solicitousness, ‘this must all seem ratherstrange to you.’

Therewas a fine view of dawn over Lundy from the top of the Castle keep, heralding aperfect spring morning. The general had moved his base of operations there.Blazing torches around the battlements made the scene look like the court ofAttila. Fixed forever in a gape of surprise, the head of the former lord of theproperty, a knight of the realm no less, adorned the flagstaff. Another lesson.

‘Thefeeling passes,’ said Samuel, dryly. There was no clue as to which particularbit of madness the General was referring, but that reply covered all.

‘Goodman. Stout stuff. Wish we had more robust types like you.’

TheGeneral may have approved but Samuel couldn't read the faces of his entourage;the various aides, bodyguards, intelligence officers and, of course, the Sicarii.They looked at him like not-especially hungry men would survey a lamb theymight - or might not - dine on. Apparently, the great man Mott had been alonefor hours past, communing with the sky and his thoughts - or something. Now, bycontrast, he seemed almost chatty.

‘Lundywas a nuisance, you see,’ the general explained, lolling back in his chair. ‘Ithas been for generations. You can't have people being pirates one day andhonest seamen the next, can you? They ought to have made their mind up longago. So I made it up for them. Problem is – was - you can't distinguish'tween good and bad by sight. Only God Almighty can separate sheep from goats;that's not given to us down here. So we hung the lot - the men I mean - andtransported the totties and brats. Shame, but there it is. Also a demonstrationfor their Irish brethren, else I'll be across the sea to teach them likewise.Besides, Lundy can be restocked. I'll hoick some beggars out of Bristol andbring them over. I think I ordered a few elderly natives kept alive to teachnewcomers the ropes....’

Heturned to his staff to check this was so and got half a dozen swiftconfirmations.

‘Thereyou are then. Intrinsically, Lundy's quite a nice place, so I'm told. StPatrick got rid of all the snakes - like he did in Ireland. Not only that, butapparently there's seals over by the western cliffs. I might go and have a lookat them: I like seals. Do you like seals? Have you ever seen seals?’

Samueldidn't want to commit himself. This was no normal conversation: innocentsounding subjects might mask lethal metaphors. So he lied and shook his head.Mott seemed excessively disappointed but soon recovered.

‘Ohdear. Never mind: you may do one day. Come back here when it's all settled.Though really it's all settled now, isn't it, come to think? Despite all theunpleasantness. Good can come out of ill, eh? Sweetness from strength – Samsonand the lion sort of thing: do you see? Leastways, that's the way I seeit.’

Thenhis tone, his expression, everything; all changed without warning; theavuncular manner snuffed out like a light.

‘Hismajesty's given me complete authority in the West,’ said Mott. ‘Mark that. Iserve him and the right as I see fit.’

Hewasn't boasting but stating a fact, seeing if, taken unawares, anyone hadproblems with that.

Samueldidn't because he'd purposefully stunned all his cussedness to rest. He wantedto get off this island. Nor was he alone in treading that path of wisdom.Mott's staff, though each twice his size and each as hard as a lawyer's heart,all looked like men on thin ice, living in mortal fear of him. The oneexception was the Sicarii - who was trained not to be read and also child of aninvincible patron.

Then,like slipping on a familiar, comfortable, coat, the General was hisold-friend-well-met self again.

‘Soyou see that I have ambitions just like you: on a different scale of course,but recognisably the same species. You're a businessman, or would wish to beone once more. I'm in business too: the business of acquiring renown. FreeWales is no more: I did that! I also dealt with Liverpool in the AgrarianCrusade. Now I'm an everlasting chapter in Lundy's history. I shall get on topof this piracy nonsense and bring peace to the West country. If Kernow shouldlift its eyes from the dust it will meet my gaze. I am making myself usefulwherever I can, tying up all manner of loose ends. This lost monastery mysteryis another such, albeit very minor. Mother Church's perspective spans millenniaand her memory isn't lulled by passing years, not like mere nations anddynasties. I've learnt that she still wonders what's down there in... in....’

‘StNectan's-under-the-earth,’ prompted the Sicarii - because no one else seemed todare.

‘Thesame,’ confirmed Mott, gratefully. ‘She also ponders the fate of the - you'veread my file of pilfered piffle, I take it? - Eighteenth centuryde-consecrating expedition. Did they succeed we all wonder? Yet technicallythere is an interdict against molestation of the site; against any revival of awarenessof it. Now, I tell you most solemnly, the Church's concerns are mine also; I'dno more go against it than I would my beloved parents. Where I am heading Icannot be seen to grapple with this issue. Yet you, dear man, have no suchconstraints: you are halfway to outlaw already! You, Samuel Trevan, are adesperate but most resourceful man. You wish to plunder the