“Do I think your father was guilty?’’ he repeated thoughtfully. “I’m afraid I do, young man. I tried hard to believe in his innocence. Such belief was earned by a brave comrade, even though we rarely saw eye to eye. You see, I never had any direct indication myself that he was a traitor. Do you understand how we operated then? Did he tell you?”
I told him that I was working more or less in the dark; I had rarely encountered my father once I had come to an age at which such matters were understandable to me, and then he had been as discreet with his family as, I am convinced, he had been with everyone else. There was always the possibility that the soldiers would come for us, and he wanted us to know as little as possible for our sake and his own.
Mordaunt nodded, and thought awhile. “You must understand,” he said quietly, “that I—very reluctantly—concluded that your father was indeed a traitor.” I moved to protest here, but he held up his hand to quieten me. “Please. Hear me out. That does not mean that I would not be happy to be proven wrong. He always struck me as a good man, and it shocked me to think that was a sham. It is said that the face mirrors a man’s soul, and that we can read there whatever is written on his heart. Not with him. With your father, I read wrongly. So if you can prove this was not the case, then I will be in your debt.”
I thanked him for his openness—the first time, indeed, I had come across such an even devotion to justice. I thought to myself that if I could persuade this man, then I would have a case; he would not judge unfairly.
“Now,” he went on. “How exactly do you plan to proceed?”
I do not remember exactly what I said, but I fear that it was of a touching naïveté. Something about finding the true traitor and forcing him to confess. I added that I was already certain John Thurloe was the man behind it all, and that I intended to kill him when I had the evidence. However I phrased it, my remarks brought a small sigh from Mordaunt.
“And how do you intend to avoid hanging yourself?”
“I suppose I must discredit the evidence against my father.”
“Which evidence are you talking about?”
I bowed my head as the depths of my ignorance forced my confession. “I do not know.”
Lord Mordaunt looked at me carefully awhile, although whether it was with pity or contempt I could not make out. “Perhaps,” he said after a while, “it might help you if I told you something of those days, and what I know of the events. I do not speak because I believe you are correct, but you do have a right to know what was said.”
“Thank you, sir,” I said simply, and my gratitude to him then was whole and unfeigned.
“You are too young to remember much, and were certainly too young to understand,” he began, “but until the very last moment His Majesty’s cause in this country seemed doomed to extinction. A few people continued to fight against Cromwell’s tyranny, but only because they thought it right to do so, not because there was any anticipation of success. The number of people sick of despotism increased year by year, but they were too cowed to act without a lead. The task of giving that lead was taken on by a handful of loyal subjects, of whom one was your father. They were given the name of the Sealed Knot, because they bound each to the other so tightly through their love of each other and their king.
“They accomplished nothing, except to keep hope alive in men’s hearts. Certainly they were active; scarcely a month went by without some scheme or another—a rising here, an assassination there. If these had come to fruition, Cromwell would have been dead a dozen times long before he died in his bed. But nothing of substance took place, and Cromwell’s army was always there, a vast block against anyone who wanted change. Unless that army could be defeated, the road to the Restoration would be forever closed, and you do not defeat the most effective army in the world with hope and pinpricks.”
I suppose I must have frowned at his criticism of these heroic, lonely men and their struggle, and he noticed it and smiled regretfully. “I do not disparage,” he said softly, “I state the truth. If you are serious you need all the information, good and bad.”
“I apologize. You are right, of course.”
“The Sealed Knot had no money, because the king had no money. Gold can buy loyalty, but loyalty, on its own, cannot buy weapons. The French and the Spanish kept His Majesty on a shoestring, allowing him enough to live in his exile, but not giving enough to do anything. But we were ever hopeful, and I was entrusted with the task of organizing the king’s men in England so they might act should our circumstances change. I should have been unknown to Thur-loe’s office, as I’d been too young to fight in the war and passed those years in Savoy for my education instead. Nonetheless, who I was became known very swiftly—I was betrayed, and could only have been betrayed by a member of the Knot, who knew what I was doing. Thurloe’s men swept me up, along with many of my associates, at the very moment when they knew we had incriminating documents on us.”
“Excuse me,” I said, foolishly risking a second interruption, even though I could see the first had displeased him. “But when was this?”
“In 1658,” he said. “I will not bother you with the details, but my friends, and chiefly my beloved wife, beggared themselves in bribes and so confused the panel of judges who examined me that I was released, and escaped before they realized the size of their error. No such good fortune was with the others. They were tortured and hanged. More importantly, it meant all my efforts in the king’s cause were in vain—the new organization I had labored to construct was destroyed before it even began its work.”
He paused, and courteously requested a servant to bring me some cakes and wine, then asked me whether I had heard this story before. I had not, and told him so. I felt like telling him also that I found it thrilling to hear such details of danger and bravado, and that I wished I had been older, that I could have met the dangers with him. I am glad I did not; he would have found the remarks childish, as indeed they were. Instead I concentrated on the gravity of the events he was describing, and asked a few questions about his suspicions.
“I had none. I thought merely I was cursed with the greatest ill fortune. It never occurred to me then that my peril might have been deliberately caused. In any case my meditations on the matter were swept away a few months later, when we heard the glorious news that Cromwell was dead. You remember that, I’m sure?”
I smiled. “Oh, indeed. Who could not? I think it was the happiest day of my life, and I was full of hope for the country.”
Mordaunt nodded. “As were we all. It was a gift from God, and we felt at last that Providence was with us. Our spirits rose immediately, and all energies were rekindled, even though his son Richard was declared Protector in Cromwell’s stead. And from that hope a new plan emerged, without it even being commanded, a way at least to rattle the regime. There was to be a rising in several parts of the country at once, by forces too big to be ignored. The Commonwealth army would have to split to deal with them and that, it was hoped, would open the way for a swift landing in Kent by the king’s forces and a rapid march on London.
“Would it have succeeded? Possibly not, but I do know that every man involved did the best he could. Arms that had been stockpiled for years against such a day were brought out of hiding; men of all sorts declared in secret their readiness to march. Great and small mortgaged their land and melted their plate to provide us with money. The sense of excitement and anticipation was so great even the most dubious were swept up in the enthusiasm and thought that, at last, the hour of deliverance had come.
“And again, we were betrayed. Suddenly, everywhere that men were to rise, troops appeared. They knew as if by magic where arms were stored, and where money was hidden. They knew who had been appointed officers, and who had the plans and lists of the forces. The entire venture, which had taken the better part of a year to bring to fruition, was dashed to the ground and trampled on in less than a week. Only one part of the country reacted swiftly enough; Sir George Booth in Cheshire brought out his troops and did his duty. But he was all alone, and had to face the onslaught of the entire army, led by a general second only to Cromwell himself. It was a massacre; as complete in its destruction as its ruth-lessness.”