"That might actually work, after all it's dark enough," he finally said and also called on the rest of our company to help. With combined efforts, the proud, snow-white stallion had been transformed into an inconspicuous, grey-black nag within a few minutes.
We had done a good job. The horse no longer looked like a breeding stallion that kings would fight over.
Throughout the whole procedure, André remained remarkably calm and tame. I wouldn't have believed even a decrepit horse to have such composure - certainly not a horse with a reputation for having thrown off hundreds of riders.
Wilbur and Vincent now spread the hay superficially on the tarp of the wagon and immediately it looked as if our wagon had never carried anything but dried-up stalks of grain.
Tom clapped his hands and said, "Now let's try our fortune, friends!"
We mounted up and Vincent gave the whip to the draft horses. I had taken a seat next to him, as I had to carry on the conversation with the gate guards.
Slowly the vehicle rumbled out of the side alley towards the city gate. The caravan of waiting merchant carriages had by now shrunk considerably and we had only two carts ahead of us. My heart was pounding as I looked at the approaching Musketeers. All of a sudden, I didn't think our idea was so brilliant after all. The French had to be pretty stupid if they didn't see through our superficial camouflage. What if they looked on the wagon? Surely they would discover the hidden clover right away. They knew what they were looking for, and they might even assume that we were pulling off a cheap deception. It was not for nothing that the carts ahead of us took so long to leave the city. Everything indicated that they had been thoroughly searched.
The last car in front of us now passed through the gate and we moved up. A quick sideways glance at Vincent and a glance at my other companions told me that I was not alone with my anxiety. Everything depended on me now.
I tried hard to find a bored expression on my face as I looked towards the approaching Musketeers. Two of the bluecoats immediately came up to our carriage and looked at us suspiciously. Had they already smelled a rat?
"What's taking you so long today?", I asked now, not wanting to arouse the guards' suspicion even more.
"None of your damn business," one of the bluecoats snorted back contemptuously. "We are Musketeers of the King and owe no explanation to riff-raff like you."
"Musketeers?", I asked, trying to sound as stupid as possible. "But since when has the the king's personal guard been in charge of watching over the city gates?"
"Shut your filthy mouth!" he now snapped at me. "And get off the cart!"
I looked briefly at Vincent, whose face had only a lack of understanding written on it, and then nodded. With a jerk, I jumped down from the coach-box, right in front of the Musketeers' feet.
"So, what is it?", I asked defiantly.
Before I could even resist, the bluecoat had delivered a blow to my ribcage and I staggered back awkwardly.
The Musketeer looked at me menacingly and raised a finger meaningfully. Apparently it was just a gesture to stop me from opening my mouth again.
And it worked. I watched in silence as two men set about circling the wagon.
Now it's over, I thought. Now they will search the cargo and they will find that the hay is just a cover. And then they will arrest us or kill us straight away.
Hesitantly, I looked around but couldn't see what the bluecoats were doing behind the wagon. So I took a few steps in their direction and now noticed that they were looking suspiciously at my fellow soldiers on the wagon. I hoped fervently that they would not address them as well, because their lack of knowledge of the French language would certainly give us away.
But immediately it seemed as if the bluecoats would be satisfied with just a suspicious look.
None of them made any effort to take a closer look at the cargo. It was really going very well.
It was only now that the Musketeers turned their attention to André de Bellegarde, who was covered by his mud coat. The horse was perfectly calm, but somehow it also seemed very tense, as if it wanted to gallop off at any moment. The eyes, in any case, flickered uneasily as the Musketeers stood before him.
One of the men now reached out for the animal's head and stroked its muzzle lightly. "Oh my God ..." he said slowly.
No, I thought. It just can't be happening! We had almost made it and now that.
But the man hadn't finished speaking: "My God, I've seen a lot," he said. "But never a nag as abysmally ugly as this one." At this he laughed uproariously and slapped his companion on the shoulder.
I had just let out a sigh of relief when I suddenly heard a shrill yell from one of the bluecoats.
In a flash, the horse had thrust its head forward and sunk its teeth into his forearm. I realised that the attack had resulted in profuse bleeding.
"That bastard!" the soldier immediately shouted and drew his rapier against the steed. "I'll kill it," he shouted and wanted to ram his blade into the horse's sides.
Neither I nor my companions on the wagon could react fast enough to prevent the attack. Instead, the other Musketeer threw himself against the jutting arm. The blade slid into nothing and the enraged Musketeer grabbed his crony by the collar. "What are you doing?" he shouted at him and pushed him off him, directly against André de Bellegarde.
The horse recoiled slightly, but the bluecoat slid against his side anyway, wiping away part of the layer of dirt that had been applied.
Immediately, telltale white could be seen shimmering through.
The Musketeer, who had just wanted to kill the horse, looked at the exposed spot for a while, strangely absent-minded. I could almost picture what was going on in his mind at that moment.
Slowly he walked towards André and looked at the spot where white fur was exposed. He now enlarged the spot by wiping the fur with his hand.
I was frozen and the men on the carriage seemed to be as well. What could we do? We watched paralysed as the bluecoat now came to the carriage and swept down some hay in one quick movement. Nodding, he looked at the clover underneath. It was just another confirmation of what he already knew. He took a breath and shouted, "Musketeers, take these men here ..."
That was as far as he got. He had made the mistake of turning his back on me. I had quickly picked up a stone and hit him on the back of the head. Unconscious, the man slapped the road dirt.
"Give the whip to the nags, Vincent!", I immediately heard Tom's shout.
Meanwhile, I had another problem. The second Musketeer had drawn his sword and now seemed to be willing to snuff out my life. I didn't feel like proving my inability to sword fight again, so I tried to escape.
The wagon had already started moving and was speeding towards the gate. I was just able to catch up with it and throw myself onto the loading platform with a diving leap before it disappeared through the gate and into freedom, past dozens of dumbfounded bluecoats.
But after just two hundred feet, a glance back told me I was too quick to celebrate.
"They're following us!", I shouted to the others.
"Bloody bastards!" cursed Wilbur, reaching for his gun.
"How many are there?" asked Vincent from the coach box, as he had to concentrate on the road.
"I count ten."
"Hurry up!" demanded Tom. "In the darkness we might be able to lose them."
Vincent relentlessly beat the poor draft horses and, galloping at full pace, we actually managed to pull out a small lead within the next half hour. The night landscape became more hilly and wooded. Soon we had lost visual contact with our pursuers and the nocturnal metropolis on the winding road.
"Turn to the right here!", Tom suddenly shouted.
Vincent jerked the reins around and sent our carriage hurtling straight between two rows of trees - right into the middle of untouched nature.
Moments later, from our cover, we saw the Musketeers riding on along the road. Hopefully it would take a while before they realised they had been led on the
wrong track.
Meanwhile, our wagon had reached dense undergrowth and was making no further headway.
Tom nodded thoughtfully and then explained: "Here we are well covered on all sides. The animals are done after that spurt, they need rest." He stroked the sweaty skin of the draft horses. "Tonight we will stay here and in the morning we will continue north. Wilbur will take the first watch, I'll be next. George and Richard take care of the horses! There'll be no fires, we'll just rest. In a few hours we'll be on our way."
Chapter 38
In the moments that night when I nodded off for a short while, I slept restlessly, rushed and dreamless. I often woke up and looked around nervously into the darkness of the forest, only to find that my companions were slumbering quietly and peacefully.
But one image always disturbed me. It was the motionless, wide-open eyes of André de Bellegarde, reflecting the spooky moonlight. This image sent a cold shiver down my spine every time. I had now witnessed how suddenly this horse could attack and was therefore convinced of its danger. But it was the eerie calm that frightened me. This animal simply did not behave like a horse. It didn't move, it didn't even shake its head or close its eyelids from time to time. It almost looked like a statue. Only the steady clouds of its breath coming from its nostrils gave evidence of life.
Worried, however, I kept giving in to my tiredness and tortured myself with brief periods of sleep until morning. The light of dawn felt like salvation to me.
Vincent, who had taken over the last watch, said loudly: "Come on, get up, men! The day is young and we have a lot to do."
With grumpy, muttering noises, the Guardsmen got to their feet. Only Richard remained unmoved. I had to shake his shoulder before he opened his eyes and showered me with mumbled insults.
While my companions were gradually picking themselves up, Vincent was already giving the draft horses the whip. We turned around and drove back to the road where we had lost our chasers the day before. They had probably realised after a short time that they could no longer catch up with us. If the light of the sun had illuminated the road at this point, they might have seen the tracks leading into the forest. But as it was, they were left in the dark.
"I can't believe they'd let us get away that easy," Tom now said suspiciously. "They know just as well as we do what is at stake. I bet they're out there waiting for us with a trap in every village from here to the coast.
"I think you're right," Wilbur now agreed. "We should avoid every village and make our way through the wilderness."
"That's what we'll do," Tom decided, slamming his fist on the edge of the wagon in affirmation. "So let's go, we don't have time to lose!"
Our wagon was quickly pulled north by the draft horses, and as I sank back into the swaying clover, I looked with an uneasy feeling at André de Bellegarde, who was following us at a rapid gallop - chained to us by his reins. I distrusted the horse's calm composure.
We passed villages without even catching sight of a single farmhouse. Every time the signposts indicated a village, we bypassed it in a wide curve. We drove like this all day and our travelling speed was quite respectable. It was only towards evening that two reasons forced us to stop, on the one hand the exhaustion of the draft horses and on the other our collective feeling of being hungry.
We chose a huge beech forest as our resting place, its tall trunks rising into the sky like the columns of a mighty cathedral. The ground was made of soft moss and really invited us to sleep. If it hadn't been for the rumbling of my stomach, I would have given in to this urge immediately, but I looked around for something to eat in the forest.
There were neither blueberries nor cherry bushes here. What would I have given for a decent meal in a cosy inn? My mouth watered at the very thought.
"It seems we have no choice but to hunt," Vincent now spoke up.
"Hunt?", Richard now asked in wonder. "If I may remind you, the only weapons you have are your rapiers. Do you mean to challenge a stag or a hare to a duel?"
"If I must," Vincent grinned.
"Are you going to slap your glove in his face and hope he asks you for satisfaction?"
"You don't trust us with anything, do you?" said Tom, shaking his head. He drew his rapier. Vincent and Wilbur did the same. Then Tom said to Richard and me, "Come along! Maybe you can learn something along the way."
We walked quietly through the grass towards dense undergrowth without exchanging further words. The Guardsmen's eyes searched the earth for tracks.
It didn't take them long to find them. The hooves of a whole herd of wild boars had churned up the ground. From the individual prints, it was easy to see which direction our furry dinners had taken.
Tom quickly followed the tracks. The Guardsmen, Richard and I followed, taking great care not to make any noise. Our feet only trod in soft moss and avoided fallen branches, the cracking of which would have sent the whole forest into a frenzy.
Tom found fresh droppings just a few minutes later - clear indications that we were getting closer and closer to our goal.
We instinctively held our breath with every further step. The Guardsmen clutched the hilts of their rapiers with their hands. A breathless silence dominated the scene as Tom bent a few branches aside to explore the way ahead.
Hidden in dense undergrowth, we now saw the pack.
I recoiled in fright when I saw the two huge boars lying in the undergrowth with several cubs and a horde of half-grown young boars.
The boars looked menacing with their massive tusks and powerful furry necks. Now I noticed Wilbur clutching the handle of his rapier like a spear and pointing the tip forward. His arm silently retracted, tensed and immediately shot forward with breathtaking force.
The sword whizzed through the night faster than a lightning strike and pierced the neck of the first boar until only the handle protruded.
With an angry screeching sound, the fatally wounded animal got to its feet again. Its small eyes twisted in spasm before it toppled like a stone to one side and died with trembling legs.
The animal's scream had, of course, alarmed the other animals and they bolted from their rest just as startled as the boar. Confused, the freshlings looked around. Some grunted aggressively, while others had already registered the death of the boar in panic.
Now the second boar had also come to its senses. Without even pausing for a moment, it raced towards us. With its tusks lowered and its eyes narrowed, it embodied pure, undisguised hatred.
And that was already the moment when Tom drew his rapier and sent the boar hurtling into the open blade. He jumped slightly to the side and watched as the pierced animal's legs folded away from under its powerful body and it slid snout first into the grass.
Now the rest of the pack became frightened. The sows and the freshlings stampeded away in a panic. The squeals of fear could still be heard long after only the two carcasses remained of the pack.
"Was that an answer, Richard?" asked Tom, beaming with joy and sweat.
"I must apologise for my doubts," he replied.
I looked at the giant fur monsters and remarked, "But now we really have a lot to eat. I mean, one pig is already enough for twenty men."
"Well, you're probably right. But the second one probably wouldn't have let us go so easily."
"We shouldn't let the cart stand so long," said Tom, a little anxiously. "Surely it was wrong to leave our precious booty unattended."
Wilbur and Vincent now set about angling a long branch out of the undergrowth. Immediately they tied the smaller of the dead boars to it with their hooves and took one end of the branch on each of their shoulders. The killed pig dangled safely between them. The other animal would surely soon serve as a feast for the wolves and wildcats.
"Come on now!", Tom urged them to hurry, and we obeyed his call.
All we had to do was follow our own trail to get back to our cart. It was not long before the wooden vehicle came into our view. Reassured, we approached the carriage when Vincent suddenly r
emarked, "Wait a minute!"
Now we looked closer and realised what Vincent's startled exclamation was pointing to. The horse had disappeared. André de Bellegarde was no longer where we had left him.
"What the hell ...?", Tom groaned and ran towards the cart.
The rest of us followed him, Wilbur and Vincent of course struggling a bit with their load.
"It somehow loosened the bloody reins," we heard Tom say immediately. "That sneaky crap horse! Pretending all the time to be the most harmless thing and then something like that ..."
"We've got to catch him again," Wilbur groaned.
"Great idea," Tom remarked, exasperated. "I wouldn't have thought of that myself now."
"What are we waiting for?" called out Richard, and everyone turned to look at him in surprise. He hadn't shown that much activity during the whole journey.
Vincent, meanwhile, searched the ground for tracks and immediately said, "He disappeared this way." He pointed to the crushed grass in front of him and headed off.
We made good progress because the tracks the animal had left behind were unmistakable.
Through dense undergrowth and tall conifers we reached an open meadow. It was covered with the most colourful flowers. The buzzing and humming of countless insects could be heard as we walked through the waist-high grass. André had made a breach in this lush plant paradise.
"We'll never catch up with him," Tom said resignedly.
And yet we continued on our walk. What else were we supposed to do? What choice did we have?
Suddenly the meadow stopped and Vincent, who was leading our group, backed away in shock. As we caught up, I too realised why he had come to such a sudden halt. A gaping chasm opened up below us, leading steeply into a narrow riverbed that meandered about a hundred feet below our position.
" Jesus Christ, I almost fell down. The grass took away my vision," Vincent exclaimed, stunned.
A cool breeze came up from the valley and with it a familiar sound. It actually sounded like a snort that turned into a choppy whinny.
Guardsmen of the King: A Historical Adventure Novel (George Glen's Adventures Book 1) Page 22
