Read an Excerpt

Riding Hearts

John Hunt Publishing Ltd.

The End?

The Riding Officer sat upon his horse as he gazed across the North Sea off the Lincolnshire coast. It was late March, the sun had not long set and he knew the worst of the winter weather was gone. The sea was like a millpond, the sky was clear and the air was cool. He knew the weather was too good for any smuggling or plundering; for the Riding Officer, good weather was a positive omen. Had that been the last of the Riding Officer's concerns, he would have been a content man.

He drummed his fingers on his horse's saddle as he recalled leaving London. It was too late now for dwelling on the past. He could not help but detest himself for the circumstances that had led him to reluctantly accepting the position of the much-maligned riding officer. Exile was the word best used to describe his residence in Upperbridge located on the North East Coast of Lincolnshire. He was employed as a coastal taxman patrolling a section of the coast on horseback, trying to catch smugglers and owlers for little or scant reward.

The year was 1797. King George the Third was on the throne of the Kingdom of Great Britain, William Pitt the Younger was Prime Minister and since 1793, Great Britain had been at war with the French Republic. In this era, smuggling was rife within the coastal communities, flooding the British market with contraband in an effort to avoid paying tax on incoming and outgoing goods. As a result, Britain and Ireland's coastlines were patrolled by customs officers on horseback, known as Riding Officers. The officers would patrol lengths of coast in all weathers looking for smugglers who were attempting to land illegal imports, owlers bidding to export goods illegally, suspicious vessels off the coast and small boats attempting to land contraband.

The position of the Riding Officer was unrewarding and unforgiving. Paid between twenty and fifty pounds a year, the officer would receive no extra fees or gratuities. An officer would also have to pay for, care for and accommodate their own horse. An officer, should they have success, also had to tackle smugglers. They would often be outnumbered and out gunned; wielding just a pistol and a cutlass, they would often find themselves far more concerned about their own lives than in trying to make an arrest in the name of king and country.

* * *

The Riding Officer knew all too well the hazards of the lonely vocation he had so reluctantly taken; the 'vacancy' had arisen when his predecessor, a young, naive man, had rashly intervened on the beach during the landing of some contraband. A young man by the name of Henry Heskett had been the Riding Officer's predecessor. A farm boy, he had moved to the coast to take on a job that served king and country. He had been in the position of Riding Officer for less than six months when he tried to tackle a group of smugglers on the beach; quickly outnumbered, he was soon to fall like a leaf from a tree in autumn. His body was discovered in an isolated spot the following day. The cause of death had been noted as a fractured skull most likely caused by a heavy blunt object; the perpetrator was unknown. By all accounts there had been a considerable number of people present but surprisingly there had not been any witnesses to the fatal incident; according to those on the beach they could only vaguely remember young Heskett being present there and none of them saw him being struck. The Riding Officer knew the cruel nature of his position all too familiarly. On the occasions when he had caught a felon himself he had to finance the prosecution from his own pocket. And on every occasion bar one the felon had walked free.

Almost everyone in the local village was involved in smuggling. The justice of the peace, the magistrate, the local landowner, the innkeeper, the tailor, the tinker, the chandler, the doctor, the rector; they were all involved. The Riding Officer was a social pariah, despised by everyone in the village, often threatened, and never acknowledged, always the last in the queue and always the first to be ignored. He was disenchanted with many aspects of his life, the vices that had brought him down, the people who had brought him down, the community which despised him. He was the sole man in the village with an honest job or occupation that wasn't supported by smuggling or used as a front for smuggling. Yet it was the community of criminals which treated him like a criminal. On the times he had taken felons to court the juries were sympathetic to the smugglers or in on it themselves. Only a few families on the outskirts of the village were not involved in the smuggling.

He would spend many cold lonely nights patrolling the coast with no company except his horse and a flask of Scotch whisky he kept in his pocket. No one spoke to him so no one knew of it; he would slip off to another parish to buy the Scotch so no one knew he drank it. On occasion he would venture to the local tavern where he would drink a jug of ale and enjoy a side of roasted meat with wholemeal bread whilst reading a book in silence. He would be all alone, the silence broken only by the derogatory comments made by some patron of the inn.

* * *

The night was clear; the Riding Officer had been patrolling for around five hours. He was tired as the light had begun to fail. His feet had become cold with the tips of his toes beginning to feel numb despite his leather boots, and the chill was biting through his overcoat.

There were times he considered working against the laws he was supposed to be upholding and instead joining the local villagers in defrauding the Crown. He could carry out his duties to benefit himself. He could join them in smuggling; he could turn a blind eye to their activities for a stroke of commission or a small payment. He could falsify his records and join in league with those he was trying to track down. But he knew, no, that it would not be worth it; he could never become one of them. He knew he was being watched; one false move and he could be hanging at Newgate Gaol. Hanged like a common highwayman dancing the Tyburn Jig. He knew he had no one on his side, no allies, and no confidantes.

It was common for a Riding Officer to come from the community he served, but not this man. His controller had chosen to place him there for a reason. To begin with, the Riding Officer was a man for whom nobody cared about in a community whose only goal was greed. No one knew who he was; no one would care when he was gone, he would have no allies within the community. He was a purposefully selected outcast – not even a caring mother or close friend would be there to support him should something happen to him.

With the night clear, no suspicious activities were in sight and as the tip of his nose began to tingle and he could see his breath plume from his mouth, the Riding Officer decided to head for home.

* * *

The Riding Officer's stretch of the coast included the village of Upperbridge where he resided. Founded in the early twelfth century and named after a small stone bridge at the top of the village, it had quickly become a bustling fishing port on the Lincolnshire coast. However, a series of storms in the late sixteenth century had caused the river Mayne that ran through the village to burst its banks on a number of occasions, washing away villagers' homes. Over the following two centuries the population had slowly dwindled, leaving only seventy-eight homes in the village.

Upperbridge was a rotten borough. Of the seventy-eight homes, there were twelve eligible voters; twelve men whose properties were valued over forty shillings and who were of the Church of England faith. Women could not vote and many men were also disqualified on religious grounds. Upperbridge had been awarded a Royal charter in the fourteenth century when it was a flourishing port, giving it the right to elect two members to the House of Commons. It was unusual for a borough to change its boundaries as the town or city it was based on either died or expanded. Parliamentary reform was still four decades away and politicians were as corrupt as ever. Many new population centres had cropped up across Britain during the industrial revolution as particular industries took hold of certain areas. For example, the Wiltshire hamlet of Old Sarum, a once-busy cathedral city that had been abandoned when the city of Salisbury was established, had only three homes and seven eligible voters – who had the right to elect two members to the House of Parliament. Yet the rapidly expanding Lancashire town of Manchester, which had a population of over fifty thousand and a thriving economy, contributed no Members of Parliament at all.

When a rotten borough such as Upperbridge had such a small electorate it often meant that the electors could be bribed, and Upperbridge was no exception. With the amount of money that pumped through the village, from the smuggling trade and the illegal exportation of goods overseas, greed was rife in the village. The local Members of Parliament would make the smuggling communities' lives much easier if they could rely on the votes of the electorate. The Riding Officer knew this was one of the main reasons his controller had sent him to this village. Everyone important would be against him and on the side of his controller, or maybe it was everyone who his controller thought was important that would be against him. The Riding Officer's controller was a Member of Parliament for Upperbridge; he knew for a blind eye here and there with an odd concession plus the occasional gift of benevolence his controller had the electorate and the borough in the palm of his hand, along with guaranteeing his seat in the House of Commons.

* * *

Upperbridge sat on the North East Coast of Lincolnshire. To the north of the village was a rocky incline known as the north pathway, and to the south a gradual incline called the south pathway where a wooden beacon sat ready to be lit at night or during storms in order to act as a guide to passing vessels. Between the pathways a sandy beach, inhabited by old fishing boats covered in tarpaulins and the decayed ruins of other boats, ran parallel to the trail that linked the two routes. The nearest building was a wooden shack that sat just off the beach on the south pathway. He reached a small junction and after a few yards the trail was no longer dust and became cobbles lined by houses of differing size and design, the shops of the local tradesmen and business owners and a daunting church that served the small populous. In the centre of the village was a popular inn. Further down the road was another venue popular with locals; Mrs Higgins' 'Guesthouse.' Continuing up the cobbles that ran out of town lay the mighty Grantham Hall peering over the village, reminding all and sundry who was looking over them.

As the Riding Officer reached the village he noticed an old man on the beach. The old man lived in the shack by the beach whilst he kept up the pretence of being a scavenger. The Riding Officer knew better; he was one of them. The Riding Officer's horse pulled up slowly. The old man scowled at the Riding Officer.

"Scum!" the old man snarled, kicking sand at the Riding Officer's horse.

The Riding Officer thought nothing of it. Being a social outcast, he was used to treatment such as this. It would hurt sometimes when he was hit by a volley of verbal abuse but these were just words and they were not the types of words that could truly hurt. The only words that hurt him were the lies he had heard in the courts made by the smuggling community when they wormed out the charges brought against them, making him look like a fool and an authority figure with delusions of grandeur.

The Riding Officer rode on, his horse's hooves clattering across the cobbles. Two men were leaning against the wall of a butcher's shop. They stared at the Riding Officer with a snarl. Their brows lowered, one man shook his head before he spat into the path of the Riding Officer's horse. The other stood with his arms folded, his brow furrowed with his mouth like a small upturned smile.

At the end of the street the Riding Officer approached a heavy man he recognised as the village draper.

"Did you catch anyone, officer?" the draper asked. He tossed his greasy hair back and ran his fingers through it.

"No," replied the Riding Officer, deliberately not making eye contact.

"Better luck next time!" the draper snarled. "You'll need it!"

The draper strode off in the opposite direction with a cruel laugh as he swung a kick at a stray dog that scurried down the street and the Riding Officer proceeded home, shaking his head. He rode around to the rear of his home then dismounted and put his horse to stable. He retired to his chamber to end his day as it had begun and as it had continued: in solitude.

* * *

Anna began to clear some tankards from a table in the inn at Upperbridge. She had just begun her shift and didn't know how much more she could take of this insufferable little village. She mopped up some spilt ale with an old tattered rag that had seen better days. She sighed. Around her were drunken men with little or no future who seemed happy to waste their lives in this crooked little nothing village full of nobodies.

Two burly farm workers arm-wrestled over a table as other drinkers placed bets on who would win. She gritted her teeth at their behaviour. A man walked in leading three little children dressed in old sacks. He reached into his pocket and slammed a handful of farthings on the table.

"Him to win!" he said.

His bet was unsuccessful as the farm worker he had picked became distracted by the man, his hand crashing down to the table causing ale to spill from tankards. The man stood open mouthed. "That's all the money I had," he murmured. "I can't buy my children any food ..."

Anna covered her mouth as she felt likely to vomit. What a terrible man! she thought, so selfish! She turned away from the arm-wrestlers like she wished she could walk away from Upperbridge. A picture above the hearth caught her eye. It was a beautiful painting of London Bridge, and she smiled. Her blue eyes lit up as she gazed at the monument over the most famous skyline in the world. That's where I want to be! she thought.

A great pair of hands wrapped around her waist. They were covered in grease and mud and were the property of a farm labourer.

"How about it, Anna?" he said. She could feel his ale-soaked breath on her cheek, and she shuddered. "How about we go out back to that old haystack?"

Anna attempted to prise the hands from her waist but it was no good. "Come on, Anna," he said, "I've heard all about you!"

Anna kicked her heel backwards, catching the man on the shin. He screamed and hopped, and a swift elbow to his ribs saw the man release his grip and tumble to the floor.

"I think that answers your little question," she said, tossing the rag over her shoulder and making a point of treading on the man's hand as she walked over him.

Anna returned the empty tankards to the bar and headed off to clean another table.

"Not fancy a go in the haystack tonight, Anna?" said a man sitting at a nearby table, as he smiled and stroked his chin.

Anna groaned. "No." You make one or two mistakes in your life and you are branded, she thought as she attempted to avoid contact with the man, so what if spend the rest of my life in hell? At least I can say I have lived.

There was an unpleasant, stubborn stain on the table. She rubbed it hard with the rag in an attempt to shift it.

"Do you know what, Anna?" the man said. He stood up and leaned to her ear, saying, "I've got four whole shillings in my pocket. They are all yours if you fancy coming outside with me and tasting some Lincolnshire sausage!"

Anna scowled. She looked the grim brute in his eyes as he smiled at her, rubbing his hand on his crotch. He blew her a kiss. Anna threw a slap to the man's face that rang out around the inn.

"May I remind you that I am unfortunately betrothed to another?" she said, pushing him back into his seat.

"Oh, yes," said the man, his eyes looking down at the table, "to Mr Lockwood."

"Yes." Her stomach was puffing in and out in her fury. "I don't need to remind you what he might do to you!"

---

Excerpted from Riding Hearts by Thomas Moffatt. Copyright © 2014 Thomas Moffatt. Excerpted by permission of John Hunt Publishing Ltd..
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

---