by Robert Adams
A handspan-wide belt, mounting the biggest brass buckle Foster had ever seen, rested on the right shoulder and bisected the breastplate, a cased sword attached to its lower ends. Laying the shotgun near to hand, Foster drew the weapon and hefted it. The straight blade was at least a yard long, wide and thick and heavy, double-edged and basket-hilted. Foster had fenced, in prep school and college, but he had never before handled a sword like this. The only one he remembered even seeing at all like it had been a Highland broadsword. There was no balance to the dead man's weapon, all the weight being in the blade. Even so, its condition testified to lengthy and hard service.
He was trying to pull a leather pouch of some kind from under the dead weight of its former owner when the shrill scream of an infuriated horse came from among the outbuildings and he glanced up just in time to see a man garbed exactly like the dead one level what looked to be a sawed-off shotgun and fire in his direction. Something spannngged on the corpse's breastplate and caromed off, leaving a smear of silvery lead on the steel.
But Foster did not see it. He had grabbed his own gun and was frantically rolling across the bare flagstones toward the tower, an angle of which offered the only nearby cover. He heard two more of the booming reports before he gained the partial protection of the roughhewn stones, but arrived there unharmed, save for bruises and abrasions.
A cautious peek around the angle of the tower revealed only the outbuildings; the man or men who had been shooting at him were nowhere in sight, though he could hear a voice shouting something or other from that area.
Abruptly, a trio of helmeted men trotted into sight from behind the largest of the buildings, each armed with two of the thick, stubby firearms. They seemed oblivious to the fact that they were all within easy range of the rifled slugs in Foster's riot gun as they jogged forward, silent but for the jingle of their equipment and the clump of their boots, their stubbled faces grim.
The man in the center had a good start of a reddish beard and he showed a gapped set of yellow-and-brown teeth in a wolfish grin when Foster's first shot—fired mostly in warning—plowed up dust and stone shards a few feet in front of his muddy boots, crackling something that sounded like "Unduhsharshed!" before bringing one of his own weapons to bear on Foster's hiding place.
As he shook the bits of rock and moss from his hair, Foster decided to stop being civilized and to start playing for keeps, as the approaching trio so obviously were. Jacking another shell into the chamber, he put the twelve-gauge slug into redbeard's unprotected face. The force of the lead lifted the man clear off his feet, throwing him backward so hard that his armored shoulders clanged onto the paving fully eight feet from where he had stood.
At this second shot, a mob of at least a dozen of the helmeted men poured from among the outbuildings, shouting and waving those long, heavy swords. With only four rounds left in the shotgun, Foster dropped the two gunmen first. As the two closest men tumbled, the mob stopped, wavered for a moment, then came on again, but more slowly this time, clearly no longer so sure of themselves.
Hurriedly, Foster jerked shells from the shell vest and fed four into the gun. Snapping his lanyard to the ring of his pistol, he drew it, jacked a round into the chamber, then removed the clip and replaced it with a full one.
"Six shells in the Winchester, eight in the .45," he mused to himself, aloud. "I may not get all the bastards, but they'll damn well know they've been in a firefight!" He loosened the trench knife in its scabbard.
"I'd forgotten, after all these years," he thought. "Forgotten how exhilarating this kind of thing can be. I wonder why I didn't stay in the army after Korea?"
When the vanguard of the enemy—now grown to more than a score, as more men trickled out from among the outbuildings—had gotten to the bodies of the three gunmen, Foster opened fire, carefully, making every lead slug count. He got five before they broke; a sixth one he shot in the back.
Slipping an arm through the sling of his hot-barreled weapon, gasping with the exertion, he was feeling for his canteen when a section of the wall behind him fell away and several pairs of strong hands dragged him down, into blackness.
——«»——«»——«»——
Shortly after Foster left his house, Arbor Collier passed out and her husband carried her up to the guest room, where she snored loudly enough for Krystal to hear above the sounds of the water in the sink and the rattling of the glasses and dishes she was washing.
Collier himself sat at the kitchen table, sipping at cold coffee. The shotgun lay on the tabletop, and thrust under his belt was a pistol he had found in the back of the gun cabinet.
As she let out the water and turned from the sink, wiping her hands, just about to speak her mind about how silly this entire gun business seemed to her, there was a booming report from somewhere beyond the big, stone building, followed, almost immediately, by two more.
Collier carefully set down his mug and grasped the ornate two-barreled gun, his jaws clenched, and Krystal thought he no longer looked at all gentle.
"Was . . . is that Bass's gun, Professor? Do you think it was?"
He shook his gray head. "No way of telling, my dear. I can only say that it was definitely a smooth bore, not a rifle or a pistol."
Before she could think of anything to say, a fourth boom reached them, then a brief pause and another, another pause and a sixth. At that, she started for the door, but the seated man closed a powerful hand around her arm.
"Where do you think you're going, young lady?"
"To help Bass. To see what's going on, anyway."
But he shook his head again. "No, I'm sorry. Mr. Foster is well armed and he seems quite a capable man, in all ways. He said that we were all to remain here and that is precisely what we are going to do."
She jerked savagely against his grip. "Damn you! Let me go. Who the hell are you to tell me what to do?"
Though he smiled, his grasp never slackened. "For one thing, Mr. Foster left me in charge, in his absence. For another, I'm easily old enough to give you fatherly advice. And for a third, I've had far more training than I care to recall in combat and general man-killing. You're unarmed; what good could you do him if I did let you go to wherever he now is?"
While he spoke, they had heard the shouts of many men, dim with distance, then two more booms, in quick succession.
"Dammit! Then you go find him!"
"Who's going to take care of those two in the parlor, and my wife?" He elevated his shaggy brows.
"Hell, I will. Give me the pistol." She held out her free hand.
Smiling, he pulled the weapon from his belt and extended it, butt first. "Do you know how to use it, my dear?"
"I . . . well, I think so. That is, I've seen people shoot them," she stuttered.
"All right." He let her arm go. "Stand at the head of the stairs, there, and fire a round into that stack of logs in the fireplace. That's a nine-millimeter; those logs are sufficiently thick to stop the slug."
"All right." Her lips tight, she raised the pistol, held it wobbling at arm's length, shut both eyes, and jerked the trigger. Nothing happened. Opening her eyes, she tried it again; still nothing. She looked, felt with her thumb, for the hammer they cocked on television shows, but this weapon had no such thing. At the sound of a dry chuckle behind her, she reddened, spun about, and thrust the pistol back at Professor Collier, saying angrily, "It doesn't work. What's wrong, did you take the bullets all out?"
"No," he answered gently. "The Luger is fully loaded and armed, it simply has the safety engaged. Miss Kent, you clearly know nothing whatsoever concerning firearms. Until you learn a modicum of their usage, you'll be far safer to let them entirely alone."
Before she could answer, there were six more booms, evenly spaced, at least one scream, then total silence for a moment . . . before the clop-clop of horses' hooves sounded from the front yard and something metallic began to pound against the front door.
And Krystal found herself rooted where she stood, unable to
move an inch, as Collier snapped the shotgun closed and headed for the door.
——«»——«»——«»——
The hands which had grabbed Foster quickly dragged him several yards along a stone passageway, then a man-shape stepped over him and, with a grating noise, closed out the last trace of daylight. Then he was pulled to his feet, turned about, and hustled up a flight of narrow, stone stairs, aware that there were persons both before and behind. His unseen captors were not exactly gentle, but neither did it seem that they were trying to hurt him. No word was spoken, only occasional grunts and one wheezing gasp.
After at least two dozen stairs, the hands halted him, then a low, narrow door opened and the two men ahead of him stooped and went through it. As he was being firmly pushed from behind, Foster, too, stooped low enough to negotiate the constricted opening. He straightened, to find himself in a high-ceilinged, if smallish, chamber, stone-walled and floored and windowless. It was completely devoid of furnishings, unless three long-bladed spears and a clumsy-looking gun could be considered furniture.
Foster would have liked to examine the gun more closely, but he was hurried through the small room so fast that his only impressions were of a trigger guard large enough to put the whole hand in, action too close to the butt-plate for comfort in handling, and a bore that seemed at least ten-gauge and possibly eight-gauge, with a brass-tipped wooden ramrod slotted into the hand-guard. One other point: overall, the piece was close to five feet long!
As for the men who had dragged him through the wall, all were at least a head less than his own six feet, a couple even shorter, but without exception they were wiry and muscular, with broad, thick shoulders and arms and big, callused hands. Their clothing was rough—brogans of half-cured hide, trousers and shirts of what looked very much like homespun broadcloth—but skillfully patched, where worn, and clean, though showing multitudinous old stains. Clothing color was uniform, looking to be that of unbleached wool.
In personal appearance, they might have been the twins of those same men who had charged toward him outside—hair and facial stubble of varying shades of brown or dark blond, fair though tanned skin, here a splash of freckles, there a hint of auburn in wavy and coarsely trimmed hair, eyes brown or blue or hazel—in short, they might have been any group of workmen encountered on any street. Might have been, save for the fact that, in most places, men who strolled down the street bearing such an assortment of lethal-looking cutlery as these bore on or in their belts would quickly have been collected and taken away to explain.
Another thick, nail-studded door was opened and Foster was thrust into a larger room, this one carpeted, wood-paneled, and furnished with a refectory table, a couple of high-backed chairs, and several stools. The table was set before the tight-shuttered windows, and behind it sat a man considerably older than Foster's captors.
One of those accompanying him crossed the room and laid the Winchester and the trench knife on the tabletop, rendered a bobbing bow while tugging at the hair over his right eye, then stepped back to his place beside the door.
The oldster tested the point of the knife, then ran a thumb along the honed edge, grunted, and laid it aside. He picked up the pumpgun and turned it round and about in his hands, then shook his balding head and laid it beside the knife. When he looked up and crooked a finger, Foster was led forward.
Pushing back from the table, the older man smoothed down the long skirts of his leather coat, thrust out his booted legs, and leaned back in the chair, clasping his long-fingered hands on the lower part of his steel breastplate.
Fixing his faded-blue eyes on Foster, he snapped something that sounded to his listener like, "Hwy? Hwah'b'y'ahboot mahn?"
Foster just looked at his questioner blankly. The words sounded almost familiar, maddeningly so, but for a moment he could not make rhyme or reason of them. Then, suddenly, as the old man began to converse with one of those who had brought him there, the words and phrases began to take on meaning. Foster decided that the language was certainly English, of a sort—Shakespearean-like English spoken with a thick, Gaelic brogue.
He spoke. "I am Sebastian Foster, sir."
The oldster's eyes snapped back to him. "Forster, be y'?" He ran a finger under his wide lace collar and moved his lips in the hint of a smile. "An' come t' help Sir Francis, en? Belike, y'll only die w' us a', but f r a', y're well come." Standing, he extended his hand and, automatically, Foster took and gripped it. "I be Geoffrey Musgrave, Squire Forster, steward o' a' Sir Francis' lands. But set 'doon."
Foster felt a chair being pressed against the backs of his legs and sank onto it as Musgrave picked up a big leather pitcher and poured measures of a pale-yellow liquid into leather mugs, then pushed one across the table and seated himself with the others. But when Foster picked up his mug, the old man rose again, holding his cup aloft saying, "Squire Forster, let us drink the health of our King, God bless him, and damnation t' a' rebels."
A sip. The stuff was sour and watery, with an aftertaste that hinted of herbs, but Foster found its thirst-quenching properties sovereign, so took several long drafts before setting the mug down. "Thank you very much, Mr. Musgrave. It's delicious, but what is it?"
The old man looked at him oddly and raised one eyebrow. "Why it be Sir Francis' famous ale, o' course. Ye looked f need a stoup, Squire Forster, an' the best be ne'er too good for a mon as would fight his way in t' die w' us."
Foster had no intention of dying, with these people or without, not if he could do anything about it. There had been a time—was it only a couple of days ago? It now seemed like far longer than that—as he had sat, watching the raging Potomac lap further and further beyond its highest previous flood-point, when he had felt very close to Carol, when he had been ready to leave a world that had become all but unbearable since her untimely death. He had deliberately drunk himself into a stupor, expecting never to waken again, but the events of the past hours, the mysteries presented for unraveling, and especially the short, vicious little gunfight down in the courtyard had brought about a fierce resurgence of his will to live.
He took another swallow of the ale. "How many men have you here, Mr. Musgrave?"
The oldster sighed gustily. "Only seven and twenty be left, alas. Mony died on the walls when first yon host come on us, more fell when young Sir Cuthbert led that braw sally forth wha' gie him his death's-wound, God harbor safely his gallant soul. These lads still wi' us be braw an' bonny a lot, but nae sojers, ye ken, for a' that their sires an' grandsires were reavers a'. Still they love Sir Francis—as do mesel' an' ye, eh?—an' they an' the sairvin' gels an' me an' ye, Squire Forster, an' the Lady Arabella, we'll cost the whoresons dear, ere Whyffler Ha' fa's!"
"When Sir Francis took to his bed—an' would ye see him, y' maun see him soon, for I dinna think he's lang tae live, more's the pity—an' command fell tae meself, I drew a' intae the north wing, here, sealed us off frae the bulk o' the hoose. We'll hold here sae lang as we can, then tae the Towerkeep."
"But," said Foster, "if you've got twenty-seven men, why in hell don't you go out and drive those few bastards out of the outbuildings? I don't think there were more than twenty-five, to start out, and I shot six of those."
"I could nae take a' the lads oot agin yon poodle-fakers; besides, they hae gonnes an' a braw plenitood a' poudre."
"Don't you have guns?" demanded Foster. "You've got one, anyhow—I saw it in the other room there."
"Och, aye, Squire Forster, gonnes in plenty, but almost nae poudre, nor ane left as can mix it. An' I wot Sir David—forsworn rebel, he be bot a canny sojer, for a' that—spiered oot our lack an' so stationed only Redhand Ramsay an' thirty launces tae hold us here until he an' his rebel reavers maun fetch back a great gonne, for he wot he cannae tek the auld tower wi'oot ane. That ane he drug here wi' him burst a' the secon' firin'." The old man showed every remaining yellow tooth in a wolfish grin. "Aye, Squire Forster, that were suthin tae see, it were! Blew the great gonne tae flinders, it did, sent a' the gonne
rs tae meet Auld Clootie, fired a' the timbers alang wi' fu' mickle caskets a' poudre!"
"Why can't someone here make powder?" asked Foster. "It's simple enough to do."
"Why surely ye ken, Squire Forster, Sir Francis be a King's man, an' what wi' a' the bad blude twixt the Kirk an' the King, none wi' sell Sir Francis the sacred poudre. Och, aye, charcoal an' bernstane we hae in plenty, but wha' gude be they wi'oot priests' poudre, eh?"
The old man could be referring only to niter, Foster thought, something simple enough to obtain, especially where there was livestock. So why all this mumbo-jumbo about sacred powder, priests' powder?
"Mr. Musgrave, you show me an old dung-heap and I'll make you all the powder you can use," he declared flatly.
The steward's jaw plopped open, his eyes goggled. "Do I ken y'r meaning? You can make sacred poudre? Frae muck!"
"Not exactly from dung, itself," grinned Foster. "Let's see if I can explain."
Musgrave stood up quickly, took a broad baldric from a hook on the wall, slipped it over his head, and positioned the long sword for easy walking.
"Not tae me, Squire Forster, I be but a poor, iggernant wight. But Sir Francis, for a' I fear me he's dyin', be a well-readed gentleman, like y'self. 'Tis past time y' presented y'sel tae him, enyhoo. Tell y' him o' this wonder o' poudre wrought by a laymon."
He waved a liver-spotted hand at the shotgun and knife.
"Tak oop y'r weepons, Squire Forster. Willy" he turned to one of the men by the door, "wher be the gentlemen's sword?"
Again Foster saw the man pull at his forelock and bob a bow. "He dinnae hae sich, an' it please ye Captain Musgrave."
Foster anticipated the question and, recalling the Civil War saber hanging over the hearth in his den, decided to say, "Your man's telling the truth, captain; my sword is heavy and it's a hot day and—"
"And," Musgrave said as he rounded the table and clapped a hand to Foster's shoulder in comradely fashion, "any mon wha' can reload sac fast and shoot straight an' mek his ane poudre oons scant need o' a sword, I be thinkin'. But Sir Francis be summat old-fashioned, y' ken? We'll find y' a sword an' a' in the armory."
