CHAPTER FIVE
June 1747, Fort William, Scotland
Colonel Mark Hutchinson sank down onto the edge of his bed with a groan of relief. It was all he could do not to fall immediately backwards onto it, coat, sword, muddy boots and all, and just go to sleep. He had never been so exhausted in his life.
Instead of giving in to the temptation he sat forward, rubbing his eyes with his knuckles in an attempt to stop them closing of their own free will. His batman had done a good job; there was a fire roaring in the hearth, a meal of bread, butter, cold meat, cheese and ale stood on the table ready for him, and as Hutchinson readied to stand, the man himself came into the room carrying a steaming basin of water along with various implements used in washing and shaving.
“Welcome back, sir,” he said, placing the basin carefully on the table, then coming over to pull the colonel’s boots off for him. His nose wrinkled as he inhaled the smell of unwashed sweaty stocking at close quarters. He put the boots in the corner of the room while the colonel removed his stock, took off his coat and rolled down the offensive stockings to reveal a pair of equally offensive feet.
“Here you are, sir,” the servant said, placing the basin on the floor. “Put your feet in that and relax. I’ll go and get some more water for shaving.”
The colonel complied, uttering a sigh of bliss as his sore and blistered feet hit the warm water. By the time the servant returned he was slumped across his mattress, fast asleep. The young batman smiled, and very gently so as not to wake him, he washed his master’s feet, applied salve to the blisters, put a cloth over the food to keep the flies away, and left.
An hour later he came back, to find the colonel in exactly the same position, snoring. He shook his master’s arm, succeeding with difficulty in rousing him.
“I’m sorry to wake you, sir,” he said, once Hutchinson’s eyes were open, “but I didn’t think you’d want to sleep the whole day away, and if you stay in that position you’ll have a terrible stiff neck in the morning.”
“No, you’re right. Thank you, Bernard,” Hutchinson said, shaking his head to clear it of the sleep-induced fog, then sitting up. He got up and walked over to the table, lifted the cover, and then sitting down started to eat.
“Sit down, man,” he said between mouthfuls. “No need to stand on ceremony. I’m too tired to discipline you anyway. Bring me up to date on what’s been happening whilst I was away. Then you can shave me after I’ve eaten.”
Bernard sat down opposite his colonel and poured a mug of ale.
“God, I hate this bloody country,” Hutchinson continued before Bernard could offer any news. “Does it never stop raining? No need to answer that.” Actually the last few days had been dry, but today, when he’d been outside the whole day and had needed it to be dry, it had rained. The whole day. Even the weather in this godforsaken country was Jacobite, it seemed.
“You need some new boots, sir,” suggested Bernard, eyeing the colonel’s bare feet.
“No, those are fine. My horse cast a shoe on the way back and I had to lead her the last five miles in a downpour, that’s all. I’d have worn an extra pair of stockings if I’d known I was going to have to walk. So, has everything gone well in my absence?”
“Mostly, sir.”
Hutchinson looked up, still chewing.
“That sounds ominous,” he said.
“The roof’s leaking in part of the barracks, the sleeping quarters. Davis had another fight with Barraclough and cut him in the arm. The sergeant gave them both fifty lashes. And some men have deserted from Inversnaid, sir. Oh, and there’s a letter for you, from London.”
If it’s another order for me to travel halfway across this shitheap to deliver a pointless message to some pompous idiot general, I’m going to hang myself, Hutchinson thought mutinously. He sighed.
“Fetch me the letter, then. Let’s get it over with,” he said. Bernard got up and went into the tiny adjoining room that the colonel had assigned as his office. “How many men deserted?” he called through as he drained his tankard of ale.
“Thirteen, sir,” Bernard said, returning with the letter. “About a week ago.”
The colonel broke the seal with his breadknife, scattering crumbs across the table in the process, and unfolded it. Bernard went to the fire and threw some more logs on to it.
“Shit,” said the colonel. Bernard looked across at the seated figure of his superior officer, who was now sitting erect. “When did this letter arrive? It’s dated April the second.”
“It’s a few weeks now, sir. We couldn’t forward it on to you because we didn’t know exactly where you were, and it’s addressed to you in confidence so no one else could open it. Did we do wrong? Is it something bad? It wasn’t marked as urgent.” The servant’s brow furrowed with worry.
“No. Under the circumstances, you couldn’t have done anything else. Inversnaid, you said?”
“Sorry, sir?”
“Where the men deserted from.”
“Oh. Yes, sir.”
“You can shave me now, then, Bernard. And after that can you arrange for my uniform to be cleaned for tomorrow? I need a good night’s sleep. I’ll be damned if I’m setting off today. It’s waited since April, it can wait another day.”
“I’m sure it can, sir,” the batman replied, having no idea what Hutchinson was talking about.
“Then I can deal with this,” he tapped the letter, “and the desertions at the same time. Although unless they’ve been stupid enough to go home, it’s going to be the devil’s own job to find them. As for this, well, it could actually turn out to be good news, after all.”
“Pleased to hear it, sir,” said Bernard, still in the dark. No doubt the colonel knew whether whatever it was was good or bad news, and that was all that mattered.
* * *
In fact, as the colonel rode into Inversnaid barracks three days later, he still had no idea whether the information contained in the Duke of Newcastle’s letter was even true, let alone good or bad news.
If it was true that Captain Cunningham was a traitor, then it would be good news, because he would finally be able to get rid of the vicious bastard. Colonel Hutchinson had been waiting for two years for Cunningham to put a foot wrong, and now it looked as though he might have.
But although Richard Cunningham was savage even by army standards and universally hated by his men, the colonel could not see him as a traitor. From what he knew of him, the captain didn’t have the brains or guile to pretend to be anything other than what he was; an ambitious brute of a man desperate to rise to the top.
But there it was. What was it Newcastle had written? The sister states that Captain Cunningham accepted the money for his first promotion in order to keep silent about the fact that she was a Papist, and that on discovering Sir Anthony was a spy, was bribed once more with the means of promotion to captain.
Yes, it was possible. Cunningham was hungry enough for promotion to do that. And he had no other way to raise funds. His father had left him penniless, the colonel knew that. And if he had achieved promotion through keeping silence, it would follow that Cunningham would not want Sir Anthony to be arrested in case he divulged what he knew to the authorities. Even if nothing could be proved against the captain, his character would be compromised, which would put an end to all hopes of further promotion.
The colonel thought back to the interview he had conducted with Richard Cunningham after his sister and brother-in-law had disappeared. His shock on hearing that his brother-in-law was a spy had been genuine, Mark Hutchinson was sure of that. When speaking of his sister, Cunningham had seemed to be holding something back, but at the time the colonel had believed it only to be that he’d known his sister to be a Roman Catholic, or some such thing.
Miss Cunningham states that it is always possible to tell if Captain Cunningham is lying due to the twitching of a muscle in his cheek whenever he utters a mendacity, of which habit he is unaware. Yes, the colonel remembered that. It was quite noticeable, but at a distance of two years, although he remembered the captain’s habit, he could not remember at which point in the conversation he had demonstrated it.
He would certainly note it now, though. This was his chance to be rid of the man he had instinctively disliked since he had had the misfortune to command him. And Cunningham’s men would have a party if he was proved to be a traitor. If. Unless, after he’d interviewed the man, he had cause to believe there was truth in the sister’s allegations, he would not destroy his career. After all, Elizabeth Cunningham was a self-confessed traitor, and it was distinctly possible that she was attempting to besmirch a loyal British soldier. Well, he was about to find out.
Colonel Hutchinson sighed. Sometimes he considered his conscientiousness to be a failing rather than a virtue.
“Gone? What do you mean, gone?”
“He’s one of the men who deserted last week, Colonel,” Sergeant Baker said.
“Cunningham? You are talking about the right man?”
“Yes, sir. Captain Richard Cunningham.”
“You oversee the mail, Sergeant. Has any mail arrived in the last, oh, two months for the captain?”
“No, sir. He is not in the habit of sending or receiving letters, so I would remember if he had.”
“Anything from London? For anybody?”
“No, sir.” The sergeant looked puzzled.
So it was unlikely anyone had informed Cunningham that he was under suspicion.
“So, what happened last week then?” Hutchinson asked.
We went out on an exercise last Friday, the twenty-ninth, sir. He and twelve of his men disappeared. We assume they deserted.”
“We. You said ‘we’. Does that mean you accompanied Cunningham on this exercise, Sergeant?”
Sergeant Baker blushed furiously.
“Er, yes, sir. Initially, sir. He stayed behind after we left.”
“With just twelve men? In hostile territory?”
“Yes, sir.”
There was something not right here. Colonel Hutchinson tapped his riding crop thoughtfully against his boot. Sergeant Baker stood rigidly to attention in front of him. His face was still scarlet, one of the unfortunate side effects of having ginger hair.
“What manner of ‘exercise’ was this, Sergeant?”
“A pacification exercise, Colonel.”
In other words, a raid on a Highland settlement. The men were under strict orders not to carry out such raids with less than thirty men. Unless Cunningham had changed drastically, he would have obeyed those orders to the letter.
“But he sent you and presumably several other men home early?”
“Er…in a manner of speaking, sir.”
What the hell does that mean?
“Stephen, how long have we known each other?” Mark Hutchinson said. The sudden informality seemed to flummox Sergeant Baker even more. Beads of sweat broke out on his forehead, even though the interview room they were in was freezing.
“Um…twenty years, sir?”
“Twenty years. And for all that time you have been an exemplary soldier.”
“Thank you, Col—”
“And a bloody awful liar,” the colonel interrupted. “For God’s sake, man, stand at ease. In fact sit down. You’re not on trial.”
The sergeant sat down. Stiffly. Mark Hutchinson sighed. It seemed that was the most relaxed Baker could manage at the moment.
“I will be frank with you, Stephen. I need to speak with Cunningham on an extremely important matter. Much as I dislike the man on a personal level, I cannot believe he would desert. The army is his life. Nor would he be likely to send a group of his men back to barracks, leaving himself vulnerable. So something happened, and I think you know what it was, or what some of it was at any rate. And I need you to tell me. I think you know me to be a fair man?”
“Yes, Colonel,” Sergeant Baker mumbled.
“Talk to me then, and I will hear you out. Informally, and in confidence.”
Stephen Baker swallowed audibly, chewed on his lip for a moment, then came to a decision.
“It was my fault, sir. That he was left with twelve men,” he said.
Colonel Hutchinson nodded.
“Tell me why you think it was your fault, and what happened.”
The sergeant, perspiring freely, told the colonel about the raid on the village, that there had been fifty of them, but only about thirty Highlanders, and most of those women and children. About the fact that they’d killed the cattle and the men who’d resisted, burnt the hovels they were living in and sent the women and children away.
“Some of the men got a little carried away with the women, sir,” Baker added.
“Did the captain attempt to stop the men getting ‘carried away’?” Hutchinson asked, although he thought he already knew the answer to that.
“No, sir. He encouraged them. That’s his way,” Baker said. “Anyway, when we were…finished, he was in one of the huts, sir. With a woman. She was screaming. So we waited for a while, and when he still didn’t come out I went in to tell him that if we didn’t leave soon we wouldn’t make it back before dark, and…” The sergeant stopped suddenly. He was no longer blushing; in fact his face had taken on a green tinge.
“And…?” Hutchinson prompted.
“I’ve never seen anything like it in my life, sir, and I hope I never do again. He…he’d tied her to the roof beams, and he was…he was…Jesus…”
“Just say it, man,” the colonel said. What the hell had he done?
“He was flaying her, sir. Alive. He’d cut all the skin back from her arms, and it was hanging in ribbons, and she was screaming…I went outside and I’m not ashamed to admit I was sick. And then I think I lost my reason. I told the others what I’d seen and then I got on my horse and I rode away. I think if I’d stayed there I’d have killed him, sir. Anyway, most of the men followed me and we came straight back here. We didn’t think much about it when the men weren’t back the next morning. We haven’t had any resistance from those parts in a while. But then on Saturday afternoon when they still weren’t back, I went myself with some other men to see if we could find them. There was a grave outside the hut, fresh, but no sign of any of the other men. So we thought that the captain was worried I’d report him and had deserted along with the others. There are a lot of desertions, sir,” he finished. He sat back, seeming almost relieved to have finally confessed.
Mark Hutchinson absorbed this information in silence for a minute. His first emotion on hearing what the sergeant had seen, to his own shame, was relief, because now he knew that whether Cunningham was a traitor or not, his career in the army was over. Rape was one thing; as much as the colonel hated it, he was a pragmatist and knew that when a man was roused to kill all his other base emotions came to the fore as well. But this, if it was true, was beyond the pale.
However, first he had to find out what had happened to Richard Cunningham. He could not just write back to the Duke of Newcastle and say the man had disappeared; he would have to do better than that.
“Is that what all the men think? Is this the first time he’s done something like this?”
“Being honest, sir, the men don’t really care what’s happened to him. They’re just glad he’s gone. I don’t know if it’s the first time he’s done that, but he’s very…er…a very hard disciplinarian and very enthusiastic in his duties.”
“Very diplomatically put, Stephen. How far away is this settlement?”
“About three hours, sir.”
“Right. I want to see it for myself. Tell the men to be ready in half an hour.”
Thankfully it was now dry, and as they picked their way carefully down the steep hillside above the village the sun actually broke through the clouds. Sergeant Baker pointed down to the forlorn little cluster of burnt-out hovels below.
“There it is, sir,” he said, indicating the one hut that remained intact.
“And you said the woman had been buried, Baker?” Hutchinson said.
“Well, there’s a grave outside the hut, sir, with a little cross made out of sticks. I assumed that maybe one of the men had done the decent thing.”
“You think that Cunningham would have waited about while one of his men buried her?” the colonel said. “It’s more likely that after he’d finished he’d have burnt the hut to destroy the evidence and finish the job, don’t you think?”
The poor sergeant blushed again.
“Yes, sir, now you say it, that does seem the most likely thing.”
While they were talking they’d arrived in the clearing. Although only a week had passed, the village had an abandoned air about it. He knew that most Highlanders returned to their settlements once they’d been pillaged. But there was no sign of recent attempts to rebuild, or that anyone had come back.
The colonel posted guards around the village, with orders to particularly watch the hillside above for any movement whatsoever, then he and Sergeant Baker walked over to the hut, stopping at the grave. There was a tiny sprig of heather lying on it.
“Was that there when you came here last week?” Hutchinson asked, pointing to it.
“I don’t think so, sir.”
“Observation, Sergeant. It can mean the difference between living and dying.”
“Yes sir.”
“Right, let’s go inside and see if there’s anything else you might not have noticed.”
Colonel Hutchinson drew his sword, just to be safe, and stepped through the low doorway.
“Jesus Christ!” he exclaimed, instinctively stepping backwards onto Sergeant Baker’s foot. The two men stopped.
“Was that there when you came here last week?” Hutchinson asked drily.
“No sir,” the white-faced sergeant said, staring in horror at the scene before him.
The soldier’s corpse, still in its full uniform, even down to the boots and sword, had been tied by its hands to the roof beams. The colonel, now over his initial shock, went over to it and, waving away the cloud of flies which completely obscured the head, discovered why.
The man’s face had been beaten quite literally to pulp, the nose flattened, cheekbones crushed, eyes pulped. Whoever had done this had been enraged; the woman’s husband perhaps? Hutchinson raised his sword to cut the ropes binding the corpse’s hands, then paused.
“Sergeant, when you came into the hut and saw Cunningham with the woman, is this the way she was tied? Think carefully.”
Baker moved forward into the hut, so as to see better.
“Yes, sir. Her arms were spread, like that. That’s how I could see the…the skin.” He took a deep breath, then clearly wished he hadn’t; the hut smelt distinctly of rotting meat.
Hutchinson cut the ropes and lowered the body carefully to the ground.
“It’s Captain Cunningham, sir,” the sergeant said, looking down at the remains of the soldier.
“How can you tell? Apart from the uniform, that is?”
“The captain has bowed legs, sir. It was something he was very sensitive about. He once had a man flogged half to death for mentioning it. Er…so it became common knowledge, sir.”
“That he had bow legs.”
“Yes, sir, and not to mention it in his hearing.”
But I’m damn sure you mentioned it out of his hearing. No doubt his nickname reflects that, the colonel thought.
Well, it didn’t matter any more. The poor bastard was dead. Next.
“You did bring the shovels, Sergeant?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good. Go and get two. We need to dig the body up, make sure it is the woman, and not one of our men. Just you and me, Baker. Tell the men to keep a very close eye on the hillside. Do not tell them what you have just seen. Is that clear?”
“Yes, sir.” The sergeant looked puzzled, but went off to do as he was told. He was clearly confused as to what the colonel intended to do.
As in fact was the colonel. He needed to think this through, and in the meantime did not want any more information to be released about the whole incident than already had been.
Thankfully the body had not been buried very deeply, indicating that whoever had done it had been in a bit of a rush. And it was definitely the woman.
Well, at least I know Baker was telling the truth, Hutchinson thought, looking at the partly flayed corpse they had just exposed.
“No need to disturb the poor woman any more, Sergeant,” he said gently. “Let’s cover her up again, and then get Captain Cunningham back to barracks. Make sure his head is wrapped up so none of the other men see it. And tell no one anything at this point. Your career depends on it. Is that clear?”
“Very clear, Colonel,” Baker said hurriedly.
Back in his room in the company of an extremely large brandy, Colonel Hutchinson pondered the situation, trying to work out what had happened. Before they’d returned to Inversnaid, he had had the men scour the immediate area for any hidden bodies or signs of burial, but nothing had been found. He took a deep draught of brandy and stared into the fire, running through everything Baker had told him and what he’d seen himself, before coming to the only possible conclusion that made any sense.
The men of the village, who had no doubt stayed in the vicinity, had taken advantage of the sudden disappearance of three-quarters of the redcoats plundering their village, and had attacked. The soldiers had run away, leaving Captain Cunningham, who was no doubt still enjoying his sick pleasure with the woman, to the Highlanders’ tender mercies. If she’d been screaming continuously as Baker had said, then Cunningham might well have been unaware of the presence of the enemy until they were upon him.
That would explain the tender burial of the woman, the makeshift cross and heather, and also the state of the captain’s face, which had clearly borne the brunt of someone’s extreme rage and distress. It would also explain why the rest of the men had not returned. Leaving your commanding officer, no matter how much you hated him, to face certain death while you saved your own skin was a serious offence.
Yes, that had to be it. But the next question was, what to do? Colonel Hutchinson knew Sergeant Baker to be an honest man, but even so, until he’d seen the woman’s corpse for himself he had been unable to believe anyone would commit such an atrocious act. If it became public knowledge that redcoat officers were torturing women in such horrific ways for pleasure, it would be very damaging for the British Army, whose reputation was not exactly glowing at the moment. There was ever-growing condemnation for the brutal way in which the Highlands of Scotland were being pacified as it was, but if something like this came out, there would be hell to pay. In the wrong hands this information could be catastrophic. The Duke of Cumberland’s reputation was suffering as it was; he was far more often referred to as the butcher than the hero of Culloden now.
So, damage limitation was the order of the day. And immediate action was needed.
“Bernard!” the colonel called. The servant appeared within moments. “Get me Sergeant Baker, will you? Straight away.”
He finished off his brandy and poured another for himself and his expected guest. When Baker appeared, somewhat breathless from running across the barrack grounds, Hutchinson motioned him to a chair.
“Have a brandy, Stephen. This is an informal interview and will remain between the two of us. I believe you are a man of discretion, but if I’m wrong and I find out, I’ll string you up by your balls. Is that clear?”
“Very, sir,” replied the sergeant, clearly terrified. The colonel was not one to make idle threats, so when he did threaten you, you took him very seriously indeed.
“Good. Now I don’t think I need to tell you that this is a tricky situation. The army’s reputation is not of the highest, especially where North Britain is concerned, and if it becomes known that evil bastards like Cunningham are abusing their position to satisfy their perverted pleasures, it will reflect badly on all of us. I also don’t think I need to tell you that leaving your commanding officer vulnerable to attack without permission, is desertion of duty, and a very serious offence. Especially when the officer in question is subsequently brutally murdered.”
The poor sergeant was white as a sheet. His brandy stood untouched on the table.
“Now I believe that after you and the other men left, the remaining soldiers were attacked, presumably by the men of the village. As the only body we’ve found is Cunningham’s, I have to assume the other men buggered off with alacrity, and left the captain to his fate. Does this seem likely to you, Stephen, in view of Cunningham’s standing with his men?”
“Yes, sir,” said the sergeant in a very small voice.
“When you came out of the hut last Friday, did you tell the men exactly what Cunningham was doing to the woman? Think carefully before you answer.”
“No, sir. I just said that he was torturing her, and I’d had enough of him and his ways.”
“Have you talked about it since, including today?”
“No, sir. I’ve been having nightmares. I just wanted to try to forget it. And then today you told me not to tell anyone anything, so I haven’t.”
Thank God for that.
“Excellent!” Hutchinson said. “For God’s sake, Stephen, relax. Providing you do as I say, I see no reason why we can’t just forget all about this unfortunate situation after tonight. Drink your brandy.”
Stephen Baker complied somewhat hurriedly, coughing as the strong liquor went the wrong way.
“Now, I think it highly unlikely that the twelve men who deserted are going to talk about what happened. And indeed it seems the only people who know exactly what went on are you, me, and the Highlander who killed Cunningham. So here is what occurred: Captain Cunningham was on an exercise in an area known to have had little rebel activity for some time. When you went into the hut to advise him of the lateness of the hour, he ordered you to go back to barracks, and told you that he would follow on shortly with the remaining men. It was a foolhardy thing for the captain to have done, but as we all know, he was very confident of his ability. Over-confident, we must now sadly surmise. It would seem that once you were clear of the area the men were ambushed and ran away, but Captain Cunningham recklessly refused to retreat and was unfortunately killed in the line of duty. It’s a sad business, Sergeant.”
The sergeant sat for a moment, silently processing this new state of affairs.
“Indeed it is, sir,” he said after a time. “Very sad.”
“Good. Now, I’ll leave you to arrange the burial of the captain. I have a couple of letters to write before bedtime. Any questions, Sergeant?”
“No, sir.”
He put down his empty glass and rose. At the door he turned back.
“Colonel Hutchinson, sir,” he said.
Hutchinson looked up.
“Thank you, sir. I won’t forget this.”
“I suggest you do, Sergeant, as quickly as possible.”
After the hugely relieved sergeant had gone on his way, the colonel settled down to write his letters. To the Duke of Newcastle he would write, in the main, the truth, missing out only that Sergeant Baker and thirty of the men had abandoned the captain on their own initiative rather than on his orders. Newcastle would not want the atrocities Richard Cunningham had committed to come to public attention, and would almost certainly be relieved that the colonel had contained the damage. At the same time, Mark Hutchinson very much wanted the duke to know exactly what manner of man Cunningham had been. The bastard was about to be buried with military honours, officially guilty only of a reckless decision to leave himself vulnerable to attack. It was important that someone knew what a brute he was.
To Anne Cunningham, of course, he would write the standard drivel that went out to all widows – husband bravely killed in the performance of his duty, very brave, died instantly, etc – the usual platitudes. He doubted she would be overly distraught by the news of her husband’s demise.
It was certain that the men who had suffered under Cunningham’s command for the last few years would be positively ecstatic at the news of his death. No doubt there would be celebrations in the barracks tonight.
Celebrations which Colonel Hutchinson intended to join them in, although unfortunately he would have to rejoice privately in the comfort of his room.
He refilled his glass and raised it in a solitary toast, his words unconsciously echoing the sentiments of Graeme Elliot, who had known the deceased for far longer.
“Good riddance, you bastard. And may you rot in hell for what you did.”