TRANT
TIM RICHARDSON
FORGETTING NICHOLAS TRANT
DATA SHEET
title: Forgetting Nicholas Trant
author: Tim Richardson
edition: edições ex-Libris ® (Sítio do Livro Seal)
front cover: The Rebirth of Hope (26/03/1809) by Alberto Bisoni (2024) cover design: Ângela Espinha pagination: Alda Teixeira
1st Edition
Lisbon, February 2026
isbn: 978-989-9198-41-8 legal deposit: 557973/25
© tim richardson
publishing and comercialization:
www.sitiodolivro.pt publicar@sitiodolivro.pt (+351) 211 932 500
I The First Encounter – After the First Encounter – Islington, Week One . .
II The Oléron Encounter – Islington, Week Two – The Book Nicholas Trant 1768-1793
III The Chelsea Encounter – Islington, Week Three – Nicholas Trant 1793-1798 – Before the 4th Encounter .
IV The Menorca Encounter – After the 4th Encounter – The War – The Chair – Islington, Week Four – Nicholas Trant 1798-1803 – Before the 5th Encounter
V The St James Encounter – After the St James Encounter – Islington, Week Five – Nicholas Trant 1803-1808 – Before the 6th Encounter
VI The Lisbon Encounter – Islington, Week Six – The Stone – Nicholas Trant 1808-1813 – The Parley – The Governor – The Family Reunited – The Intervention – Before the 7th Encounter – JJ
VII The Porto Encounter – Islington, Week Seven – Nicholas Trant 1813-1818 The British Subscription – The Fall – The Brazils – Before the 8th Encounter
VIII The Westminster Encounter – Islington, Week Eight – Nicholas Trant 1818-1823 – The Confrontation – Before the 9th Encounter
IX The Knightsbridge Encounter – The Exfiltration – Islington, Week Nine Nicholas Trant 1824-1828 – Before the 10th Encounter
X The Cork Encounter – The Pigs – Islington, Week Ten – Nicholas Trant 1828-1833 – Before the 11th Encounter
XI The Mayfair Encounter – After the Mayfair Encounter – Blenny’s Tale Islington, Week Eleven – The Cottage – Nicholas Trant 1833-1838 Before the 12th Encounter
XII The Great Baddow Encounter – Islington, Week Twelve – JJ’s Tale Annette’s Tale – Anty’s Tale – Lord Wellington
XIII The Final Encounter – Clarissa’s Tale – Islington, Week Thirteen
Preview
DEDICATED TO
A K A McQ without whom, none of this would have happened
PUBLISHED BY KIND PERMISSION OF SIR NICHOLAS TRANT AND THE MEMBERS OF THE COMMITTEE1
PUBLICATION OF THIS FIRST EDITION HAS BEEN MADE POSSIBLE THANKS TO A GENEROUS CONTRIBUTION FROM THE BRITISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF PORTUGAL
1 See Footnotes at the back of the book
Preview
Preface
“Harry Potter!” – English child “Harry who?” – English parent
June 1997
It is somewhat ironic that the title of this book might turn out to be its own salvation
If you are reading this, already knowing who Nicholas Trant is, then the author will have achieved what he set out to do, quite by chance, in 2021
Had Wikipedia existed back in 1997 and you had searched for the Wikipedia entry for Harry Potter, you would have drawn a blank At the time of writing this book, on a balmy windswept afternoon on the outskirts of Lisbon, in June 2023, a search for the Wikipedia entry for Nicholas Trant gives a scant seven paragraphs, ending with the most injurious sentence of them all:
Wellington wrote critically of Trant, “a very good officer, but a drunken dog as ever lived ”
One might at this point suggest that Trant must be turning in his grave at this remark, perhaps an unquiet spirit I will go further and state categorically that Trant is turning in his grave, and he has commissioned me, out of nowhere, by some sleight of manipulation that I fail to comprehend, to put things to right
I do not mind being ordained in this way, just as J K Rowling did not mind when Harry Potter was presented to her out of nowhere one afternoon on a train journey to Manchester .
In his time, Trant was famous, indeed he was considered by some the saviour of Portugal, and yet now, as I write this, Portugal has forgotten him .
In this land where nearly every street is named after someone, there is not even a Beco2 Nicholas Trant, let alone a Rua or an Avenida .
So now is the time to stop forgetting Nicholas Trant …
2 Beco = Alley, Rua = Street, Avenida you will have to look up yourself .
Acknowledgments
Inspiration is nothing more than overhearing the conversations of the spirits
This work of fiction, based on as many facts as the author could gather, is the culmination of a remarkable series of coincidences, so many that it really looks as if this was planned all along and I was the one who just happened to be in the right place at the right time
The Committee – who deny even existing so you will have to make up your own mind as to their veracity – may have decided that they finally had a suitable asset: an English gentleman with fluent Portuguese, knowing much about Nicholas Trant, and moving to Portugal with time on his hands
They arranged – in such a way that I was blind to their devices – for me to find a forgotten biography3 of Nicholas Trant in the ancient library of the University of Braga to whet my appetite They also went out of their way to scatter timely jewels in my path, ensuring The British Historical Society of Portugal was about to publish a major article on Trant in Porto, and making sure that Mark Crathorne happened to introduce me to Rui Moura, author of an important article about Trant, at their annual Lunch
And what are the chances of then going into the second hand book shed at Midhurst Gardens in the Cotswolds for a few minutes, picking out a £3 volume at random and later discovering it to be a key piece in the jigsaw puzzle of Trant’s early life?
They went to great lengths to arrange for me to discover an unlisted, unknown and unpublished 2010 thesis by Peter Deller in Cork . His in-depth research and appendices proved invaluable, and – like me – he believes that Trant should not be forgotten .
As for the somewhat unusual structure of this book, any credit should go to The Committee, it just happened . For me, it has been a joy from start to finish.
Perhaps most important to note is that this book is not the ending, this book is not the point, this book is merely the catalyst for closure . There has to be the statue.
Cascais, Portugal December 2025
3 For this and all others mentioned on this page see Further Reading in the Appendix
IThe First Encounter – After the First Encounter
Islington, Week One
THE FIRST ENCOUNTER
Oléron, France – 1788
We do not choose our dreams Our dreams choose us
And it was James Luard who was chosen to dream the first of many dreams that would change his life – and many others – during the unusually warm summer nights of 2023.
The first dream occurred while Jim – as we shall call him – was fast asleep in Islington, a comfortable part of the north of London. He lay under his summer duvet, snoring gently and at peace with the world, when it happened.
Jim dreamt of blue and white lights, rippling like water. A sound like wind. He was floating, down, down onto a simple rush chair below him.
The lights faded away, the wind faded away, it was almost silent.
Jim opened his eyes and looked around him . He was sitting on that rush chair . His blue notebook, kept beside his bedside for occasional moments of inspiration, was resting on his lap .
A sound of legs adjusting on the other side of the room . A room with stone walls, windows high up with cast iron grilles painted green with iron knots at the joints . A sturdy wooden door with a uniform and a scabbard hanging on it. An unmade bed. The flagstone floor, covered in bits of straw.
Another sound of legs scraping the floor. A snore. To the left of the door, a huge wooden table covered in an untidy mix of books, documents,
candleholders and a flagon. And just visible behind this mess, the head of someone fast asleep, slumped on the table .
Jim decided to stand up, but in doing so the rush chair scraped on the floor. The head looked up, glimpsed Jim, and sat up straight.
Jim now saw a young man in a white shirt, staring at him . The next second the young man was on his feet, and in a lightning move had sprinted across the door, pulled his sword out of the scabbard, and pointed it menacingly at Jim .
Jim was paralysed with fear . The young man challenged him:
“Debout monsieur ! Qu’est-ce que tu fous dans mes quartiers ?”
Under the circumstances, Jim considered it appropriate to carefully place his notebook on the chair, and surrender He raised his hands high in the air .
“Sorry, sorry!”
The young man, appearing relieved by such an immediate capitulation, lowered his sword slightly .
“Anglais? English?”
Jim nodded emphatically: “Oui, Anglais – English!”
The Frenchman switched into perfect English, with an Irish accent. “Sir, what are you doing here? In my quarters?”
“Your quarters?” said Jim, utterly at a loss .
The Frenchman turned Irishman pointed to himself . “Yes, I … Nicholas Trant … these are my quarters!
For Jim this situation was beyond weird . “Your name… is Nicholas Trant?”
Nicholas Trant realised that he must be dealing with an imbecile . “I ask you again Sir, what are you doing in my quarters?”
The imbecile was now wide- eyed in astonishment, muttering: “I must be dreaming . . . Nicholas Trant? Hang on . . . “The imbecile was now scratching his head as if trying desperately to remember something . Or perhaps he needed a thorough wash . No, he was too smartly dressed for that .
Then the imbecile had a revelation . “Trant Car Hire!”
Trant watched as the imbecile talked nonsense, but the nonsense gradually made sense .
Too much sense .
“Trant – wait a sec – Car Hire Trant! Nicholas Trant of Car Hire Trant !”
Trant could not believe it . “Caheratrant? Holy mother of God!” How could the imbecile know his family came from Caheratrant? But there was more .
Jim was getting more excited as he started remembering . “Cork! You were born in Cork! And … and you have a brother Thomas! He was a great admirer of Marie Antoinette, wasn’t he! “
Trant was becoming aware of how dangerous this all was . A stranger in his room, moreover a stranger who was talking of the present as if it was the past …
“Was?” said Trant, stopping Jim, who was about to reveal even more “Sorry?”
Trant continued, “You said my brother was an admirer of Marie Antoinette He has changed his opinion?”
Jim checked himself This was so strange – it was as if he was actually talking to Nicholas Trant!
“Your attire, Sir”, Trant said, pointing at Jim with his sword, “… is strange to me . Is this some foreign fashion I am unfamiliar with?”
Jim had not even noticed until now that he was wearing his office clothes – shirt, light blue jeans and brown sneakers . And it was at this moment he had the remarkable presence of mind to convince himself that he was actually dreaming . Dreaming a full colour, stereo dream .
Did he want it to end? No he didn’t. He needed to find something to say
“My name is James… I am not of this place…” – at least Jim was being honest
Trant snorted and slammed his sword on the table . Unsure how to gain the initiative, he slumped into the chair behind his desk Jim stayed frozen in his seat .
Trant stared at Jim, drumming his fingers, thinking, unafraid.
There was something decidedly un-natural about the man whose name is James confronting him in his own quarters He changed tack
“James… Are you… are you perhaps the ghost of my ancestors?”
Jim tried to suppress a chuckle but he could not help himself, it was all so absurd. He could understand why Trant would make such an observation, but Jim needed to be careful.
“No, I am not the ghost of your ancestors . Just consider me as a … a friendly visitor ”
There was a long, confrontational silence. Finally Trant decided a different approach .
“Your accent is not familiar to me…”
Fair enough, thought Jim . Nicholas Trant would never have heard BBC English being spoken, it did not even exist in his time . Perhaps a white lie might be appropriate…
“I come from Pevensey, on the south coast of England . A small village . We all speak like this…”
This explanation seemed to satisfy Trant . He remained silent, thinking . Suddenly he stood up as if he had made a decision, then decided against it and sat down again . More silence, Jim was aware of horses’ hooves clattering and echoing beyond the window
Jim decided it was his chance to seize the initiative . “Where are we?”
The imbecile again “You do not know where you are? You are in my quarters, Sir!”
Jim tried to be conciliatory, pointing to the window: “I would be grateful if you could tell me where we are…”
“Where we are?” replied Trant, “We are in Oléron ”
Jim was not sure if he heard correctly: “O’Leiron . So, we are in Ireland?”
“No, Oléron, we are in France ”
France? Jim was now confused . He knew that Nicholas Trant would at one time be in France because of that incident with Napoleon, but surely Trant, he cannot be more than twenty, would have been living in Ireland?
“How do you spell it?” asked Jim Trant spelled it out, letter by letter . “O l e r o n . ”
Jim opened his blue notebook and wrote down the name
Trant observed that the strangely dressed man sitting on the rush chair, who was perhaps about sixty years old, appeared to write a word with his pen, yet he had no ink well . Nothing made sense, unless … Trant shifted uncomfortably
“You are judging me?”
Jim did not understand “Judging you?”
“You are judging me for the afterlife?”.
Jim considered the question Maybe Trant was thinking that Jim was a messenger of Death?
“No Sir, I am not judging you ”
Trant was tired of this . He got up from his desk . “I ask you once more Sir, what are you doing here? In my quarters?”
Jim was determined to find out more. He asked “What year is it?”
Jim had clearly misread the situation . Suddenly Trant was lunging forward at him and grabbed his arm. Jim’s notebook slid to the floor with a loud thump .
Blue and white lights, rippling . The sound of wind . Just for a few seconds .
Then Nicholas Trant stood stock still, in shock .
He was standing in front of the rush chair . He knew – in fact he was absolutely certain – that he had just reached out to grab that intruder and felt the warm flesh, the intruder’s notebook had slipped to the floor with a thump, and with that thump the intruder and the notebook simply … did not exist!
After The First Encounter
Trant walked backwards to the door, his heart thumping . He sheathed his sword, went into the long stone corridor and out into the evening air . He breathed deeply . Long breaths . He paced around the exercise yard of the fortress of Oléron until his heart and mind had settled down . How could these things be known?
How could a – a something – know of his brother Thomas? Well, that might be explained, everyone in the Regiment was in admiration of his older brother .
But then, how could a – something, with an English accent and strange appearance, know of his ancestral land, of Caheratrant?
This was family folklore, not something the Trants shared with others . In fact, he had not even heard mention of the name Caheratrant for years
And the uniform of this stranger? So different, and yet so well cut, so neat Maybe the English tailors had developed new techniques Trant had never been to England .
No, it made no sense, he had just been imagining
He had been celebrating the promotion of one of his fellow officers in his regiment earlier that afternoon, and he had drunk more than usual and ended up asleep at his desk . Maybe he had just dreamed everything . Determined not to be intimidated by this inexplicable visitation, Trant decided he had walked enough and went back into his quarters .
But the visitation had returned, sitting on the rush chair, notebook open, looking at him .
Preview
ISLINGTON, WEEK ONE
THE FIRST WEEK OF JUNE, 2023
Jim lay on his bed in his upstairs bedroom in Islington, not moving His arm hurt, he had just been attacked .
That was a strange … dream It must have been a dream, here he was back in his bedroom and all was well with the world .
There was a name … Oléron Oléron, Oléron Jim reached out for his notebook but it was not there. It was on the floor, open on the same page as in the dream, and there on the page was … nothing
Oléron, Oléron, Jim scribbled it down on the page, and then the alarm clock went off and daily life took over.
The reader should now be confused, indeed an alert reader would flag up the weirdness of Jim having a dream and knowing that a chap he has never met comes from Caheratrant – of all places – so an explanation is in order .
Jim Luard did indeed know of the chap, but of course he did not know him personally as Nicholas Trant had unfortunately died before he was born . And by that we mean really, seriously died, as in nearly two hundred years’ worth of pushing up the daisies .
And Jim had a book . And this book mentioned Caheratrant .
And Jim had a cousin in Michigan who had done an ancestry tour in Ireland and sent everyone a postcard of the sign, Caheratrant, on a large slate slab set into the grassy bank at a road junction in the middle of the countryside .
The cousin had written on the back “Ask around for Car Hire Trant and eventually you will find it!”. The postcard was taped on to his fridge door. Now, two hundred years is time enough for a chap to fade away from collective memory .
Some of us achieve biographical oblivion in just a handful of years, such is our insignificance.
Nicholas Trant did have one advantage over us though, he was a knight, he was Sir Nicholas Trant, and in Victorian times (he died right at the beginning of her reign) the sole knight in the entire family was a front runner for being mentioned by children and grandchildren when those awful social climbers questioned their pedigree .
Close on two hundred years later, Nicholas Trant was nearly completely forgotten by the world, although Jim, and his cousin Kathy (who had done a lot of ancestral research), were well aware of him .
Nicholas Trant was Jim’s great, great, great grandfather .
Jim had a specific reason for knowing of Sir Nicholas Trant from an early age, but that will be revealed in time . A couple of things had stuck in Jim’s mind though; that he came from Caheratrant in Ireland, and there was the story about Trant’s brother Thomas, and that Thomas was given a lace handkerchief by Marie Antoinette, the Queen of France
We in our time are blessed with the internet and the luxury of being able to research almost anything, and find documents so hidden away that even ancient librarians had forgotten their existence .
Despite this, Jim – who freely admitted that he was no expert in matters of the internet – had tried a lot of research and found so little . It was almost as if Trant had been forgotten, his presence fading away while his contemporaries kept on shining . Jim guessed that he was himself to blame for not being adept enough to find stuff on the web.
BBC, LONDON, FIRST WEEK OF JUNE 2023, THE FRIDAY
Jim worked as a journalist at the BBC . Always busy . It seemed like an age until Jim had five minutes to spare in the middle of the morning to Google for Oléron and Nicholas Trant .
One single entry:
Full text of “Letters of Colonel Sir Augustus Simon Frazer, K . C . B . commanding the Royal horse artillery in the army under Wellington . Written during the peninsular and Waterloo campaigns”
In which it was said:
we had repaired for artillery the bridge over the Gave d’Oléron, near Bidache. There will be some interesting movements which I shall not see, having, together with Dickson and the other artillerists of head-quarters, been directed to remain here and “see Hope’s column over the river.”
Jim looked up Google maps for Bidache in France, and there was a Gave d’Oloron as well:
… but the date of this Colonel Frazer’s letter was Feb 21, 1814, and he knew from The Book, and his own meagre research, that Nicholas Trant was not in France in 1814 . He tried another search
PreviewAnd this time he found something interesting…
Trant, Sir Nicholas | Dictionary of Irish Biography … the family was of Danish origin. He passed his youth in Co. Kerry before travelling to France, where he was educated in a French military academy. In the État Militaire de France of 1786 he is mentioned as a lieutenant in the regiment of Comte Walsh de Serrant, then stationed at Oléron. After the French…
Jim noted the names in his notebook, got up from his desk, made himself a strong coffee in the office kitchen, and returned to looking at this entry on the screen… .
Megan, the pleasant office assistant whose job it was to keep a tab on everyone and everything, knew Jim was different today. Something was wrong .
“Jim!”
Jim looked around . “Oh, what, sorry…”
“You have been stirring that coffee and staring at that screen ever since I went past! Are you here? Are you with us?”
It was a perceptive question . Jim decided to duck it… “Oh, ah, yes, sorry, got hardly any sleep last night.. That’s why the coffee…”
“No problems, just to remind you that we have a meeting in the Conference Room in …” Megan checked her watch – “minus two minutes ”
That night after supper, Jim sat on his bed, opened the page where he had scribbled Oléron and Comte Walsh de Serrant and added the words Lieutenant and 1786 .
He spent a long time looking at those words, concentrating, trying to make sense of it all .
On one level, it was quite simple; he had gone to sleep, had a dream, and woken up. The notebook could have been knocked off his side table to the floor as he turned over.
But what about Oléron? Where had that come from? Some late night search on the internet that his conscious self had instantly forgotten?
“Kathy?” he said to himself . Yes, that was a possibility . His cousin had probably mentioned Oléron on one of his visits to Worthing He did have a tendency to stand at the window stirring his tea, watching the sea… on more than one occasion Kathy had chided him for not hearing a word she had been saying .
Yes, that would make sense, it was a dream . It seemed so real, but it was just a dream .
But then, the following week, the second Thursday in June, while fast asleep and once more at peace with the world, it all happened again .
The Oléron Encounter – Islington, Week Two
The Book – Nicholas Trant 1768-1793
THE OLÉRON ENCOUNTER
1788 – Oléron, France – one hour later
Jim dreamt the same dream, blue and white lights, rippling like water. A sound like wind. He was floating, down, down onto that same simple rush chair below him.
The lights faded away, the wind faded away.
He felt the imprint of the seat. He opened the blue notebook on his lap.
On that same page, now more words:
Comte Walsh de Serrant
Oléron Lieutenant 1786
He heard the door opening and looked up . Nicholas Trant was standing at the open door, astonished Jim decided to take up from where he had left the week before . “Lieutenant Nicholas Trant of Oléron, is it 1786?”
Trant could not understand what was going on, but decided to be civil . He closed the door and stood there, arms crossed . “It is September, 1788 . ”
“1788,” Jim repeated, crossing out 1786 in his notebook . “So you must be … twenty years old?”
Trant replied “Nineteen . Soon twenty” .
Jim was astonished at the maturity and composure of someone so young . He decided to voice his thoughts . “You understand that this is a dream?”
“I understand nothing,” Trant replied, “however I will not let you perturb me . ”
Jim thinks a bit… “I did not know you had served in France . Can I ask you some questions?”
“… had served ?” Trant questioned, once again on guard .
“Sorry, you are serving – of course!”, said Jim, annoyed with himself
Trant pulled the chair from behind his desk and placed it in front of the door, backwards, blocking it .
He then sat down, facing this strange and – thus far – harmless visitation, crossing his arms on the back of the chair .
“Twice, Sir, you have talked of the present as if it is the past .”
“As you can see, Sir, I am confused,” Jim shrugged, “I did not even know which year it is . ”
“James of Pevensey… James the questioner . James the visitation . James the … mysterious . James the … entertainer .
Entertain me James, then I will see if I answer your questions . ”
Jim was aware enough to reckon that with the wrong word, the wrong action, this dream – or whatever it was – would end . What if this dream actually worked? What if he really found out things that were not even tucked away in a corner of his subconscious? He could try leading Trant on with what he knew, or thought he knew, maybe that would draw some sentences out of him .
“As far as I remember the Trant family has been in the military for generations . Can I ask why you are in a military … establishment… in France? Surely you could be training in Dublin, or … Sandhurst for example?”
“Sandhurst? Where is that?”
“In England Southern England ”
“Never heard of it4 .” Trant replied . “So, James of Pevensey, I take it that you are no Catholic?”
4 Sandhurst is known in the UK as the place where military officers are trained, however it was not set up until 1812, some 20 years after this visitation . It replaced the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich (established 1741), which Trant would probably not have known about either .
“No, actually…”
Trant snorted, stood up, turned full circle and sat down heavily on the chair, again facing the wrong way.
“Mother of God, a Protestant visitation! Have I sinned so much? God Give me strength…”
“But please, “said Jim, “tell me why you asked . If I was a Catholic?”
“Because you seem to know nothing! Because, Sir, you kill Catholics! Did you know – no it is clear that you don’t – your English army is a Protestant army . What you clearly also do not know is that we, the descendants of the great warrior clans of Ireland, we are hated for our faith, if we choose the military life then it cannot be with you! “
Trant paused, thinking of a new approach, then continued, his voice full of sarcasm . “I will imagine you are twelve – no, ten, because that is a question that a ten-year old might ask of me .
So, ten-year old James, I will explain .
We Irish of the military, we only serve Catholic kings, we have for several generations, we have Trants in Spain now in the service of King Carlos the Third, and we have Trants here in France now serving His Royal Highness Louis the Sixteenth .
And if ten-year-old James says he wanted to serve your George The Third, your Protestant sovereign, I would probably be in a mind to strike down ten-year-old James on the spot – and I have no doubt your mother would thank me for it!
Understood?”
Jim nodded sheepishly .
“Now ” Trant continued, “since it is apparent to me that you live under a stone – although how you know what you know about my brother disturbs me – I will set out the picture for you We, Catholic, Irish have served this Catholic French sovereign as we have served a dozen sovereigns before him ”
This imbecile really needs to be educated, thought Trant . “Now have you heard of the Swiss Guard in the Vatican?”
Indeed I have .” said Jim, encouraging the conversation
“So, do you know why the Pope – our Pope – employs the Swiss Guard5?
5 Founded by Pope Julius II in 1506 . Preview
Jim paused, ensuring he gave the right answer: “I guess it is because as the Swiss Guard are not Italian they will not change sides, they will always be loyal to the Pope . ”
Trant continued: “So why does the French sovereign employ the services of four regiments of Irish soldiers?”
“OK, so it is because you are not French you will not change sides, you will always be loyal to the French king . ”
Trant clapped his hands sarcastically: “My dear Protestant visitation, I underestimated you! You are definitely more than ten years old! But wait on Sir, you are hoodwinking me – I said you are here to entertain me, not me to entertain you!”
Trant needed time to analyse the situation, it suited him to continue the conversation .
Jim looked at the page in his notebook . “Why did you choose Serrant’s Regiment?”
“Walsh’s Regiment .” Trant corrected him . “So you know that my commander is the Comte Walsh de Serrant, eh?”
And Trant punched through thin air . Preview
Trant’s mood suddenly changed . He realised he was being taken for a fool . “Ah, now I get your game! My brother Thomas told you, that’s what it is, it all makes sense now, he told you about Caheratrant! Of course, here I was … hallucinating, thinking you were some … extraordinary visitation but all the time it was Thomas! …”
Trant was now shouting . “So, James of Pevensey who takes me for an idiot, I will give you a message for my brother that he will never forget!”
Trant removed his jacket, his Irish blood heading for boiling point .
Jim reckoned he had just a few seconds left to live .
Time was slowing down .
Then suddenly an image flashed into Jim’s mind.
Inobi – the blue notebook of Inobi !
At that moment, Trant, working himself into a blind fury because of the trick his brother had played on him, rushed forward to punch Jim in the face .
But Jim remembered what Inobi did Just like Inobi, Jim held his notebook out with both hands and dropped it hard on the floor. Blue and white ripples of light
The flesh and bones that should have absorbed his punch had evaporated, leaving Trant to topple into the rush chair and crash to the floor shouting angrily.
Hasty footsteps could be heard running towards his quarters . Trant recognised the concerned voices of a couple of his comrades outside his quarters .
The comrades entered to find a confused, angry and bruised Nicholas Trant in the corner of the room, sprawled over the broken rush chair . There was no need for an explanation .
Trant was summoned before Count Walsh de Serrant and charged for being drunk while on post . His hitherto clean record sheet – of which he was so proud – was now besmirched by a black mark .
His punishment was two weeks of night duty on the harbourside garite6, a freezing cold corner of the defensive wall of the fortress, with vertical slits, open to the elements, just in case he wanted to shoot arrows he did not have down upon an invader that did not exist .
Trant spent those two weeks keeping himself warm with his anger, promising himself that if ever that blasted James of Pevensey showed his pale face again, he would run him through with his sword and to hell with the consequences .
But James of Pevensey never returned to Oléron .
And over the years, the vivid reality of that visitation also began to fade and become instead explained away as a strange figment of his imagination . 6 watchtower
Preview
ISLINGTON, WEEK TWO
THE SECOND WEEK OF JUNE, 2023
Jim gasped and sat bold upright in bed, shouting No, No, Stop!
The response was utter silence, apart from the sparrows chirping outside . It was a sunny morning in Islington
The notebook was on the floor, open on the page he had been reading. Without leaving the comfort of his duvet, he grabbed the notebook and dragged it across the carpet so it was below him .
Comte Walsh de Serrant
Oléron Lieutenant 1786
But… he had crossed out 1786 and written 1788!
Jim thought a while about this .
So, he had dreamt he was with Trant and had revised the date, and now he wakes up and the date has not been changed .
He thought to himself; maybe, this is a good thing… maybe I was really just dreaming… and then he remembered Inobi in his dream . Inobi and the samurai
A long time ago, when Jim was a young man in Hong Kong, he got a part time job in a TV studio, they had to dub a Japanese manga TV series into English and he was given the main character of Inobi to dub . Inobi was a pesky child with a mop of unruly hair who was constantly getting into scrapes but always managed to escape by slamming his blue notebook on the floor.
This somehow caused him (and the blue notebook) to disappear through the floor so he could live for another day And Jim, about to be run through with Trant’s sword, suddenly recalled Inobe’s escape from a mad samurai and knew what he needed to do, drop the notebook fast – and it had worked!
Jim was nevertheless really upset by these vivid dreams that he was having, two in a row!
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