The iroh chain ps-2

by Jim DeFelice

  " You stand at the doorway — fire it only if they wake."

  " We should kill them all while they sleep," said Rose.

  " Trust me," said Jake, patting her shoulder before putting out her candle with his fingers.

  The Tory troop had arranged itself in symmetrical fashion against the barn wall to the right, sleeping on field cots in apparent contentment. Undoubtedly they had been tired by the march back from Salem, during which they'd had to walk their bloated horses.

  The effects of the herb had worn off by now, the horses' over-stimulated digestive tracts having worked all afternoon to evacuate the poison. They did not seem to bear any grudge toward their tormentor; indeed, the first animal he approached nuzzled against him, apparently remembering that Jake had given him sugar earlier in the day.

  The stallion's reins were looped over an iron ring at the side of the stall. Jake placed the candle on a post next to three freshly oiled saddles and quietly prepared the animal to be ridden.

  He had just rubbed the neck of a second horse in an attempt to persuade him to accept his role as a Revolutionary gracefully when a loud voice outside challenged Rose.

  " The sergeant needs you in the house," he heard her say. "There are American thieves afoot."

  Jake did not hear the reply to this, if there was one, for it was drowned out by the report of a musket. Cursing, he jumped up on the second horse's unsaddled back, grabbing at the reins of the first animal and kicking his mount toward the door.

  As the horse leaped into action, Jake lost his grip on the other's rein. But his lunge brought his hand to the post where the candle was, and a sudden stroke of inspiration made him swat the candle to the ground. It fell against a pile of straw which had earlier sopped up some of the excess wax used on the saddles. Worn by the breeze, the candle's flame fluttered, unsure whether to exert itself. Then it remembered its patriotic duty, bucking itself up like a private enlisted for the duration — bold yellow tongues shot up to the rafters.

  " Fire!" yelled Jake as he prodded his horse toward the door.

  Confusion erupted with the flames. The horses screamed; men fell from their beds shouting. Jake held tight to the neck of his mount as he followed his instincts, plunging toward the barely opened door.

  They had just crossed the threshold when a dark shadow leapt at his side. Jake turned to push it away — then realized it was Rose.

  " You took your time," she told him curtly, pulling herself up behind him. " I thought I would have to hold off the entire troop."

  " You'd have beaten them, I'm sure," yelled Jake as he hunkered down on the horse and headed for the road.

  " The Tories may realize something's wrong if I don't make it back to jail quickly," Jake told her when they finally stopped two miles up the road. " We'll have to split up."

  " Be off then. I know my way to Robinson's Bridge where the Continentals are camped."

  " Old Put's house is in the village of Peekskill," said Jake, slipping off the horse. " It should be obvious from the guards. Remember everything I ' ve told you. And if anyone stops you — "

  " I'm not a simpleton. A child could deliver your message successfully. "

  " Putnam won't believe a child," said Jake. He reached into his shirt and drew out his Segallas. " Show him this pocket pistol as soon as you arrive. He'll know it's mine. There isn't another one like it in the colonies."

  " The general knows you that well? "

  " The old man and I have sung a few songs together at Fraunces Tavern. His ' Maggie Lauder ' is quite good." Jake looked down the road. The Tories had not mounted a pursuit, undoubtedly concentrating their efforts on saving the barn and their horses. They seemed to have been successful — the telltale glow such a great fire would produce was notably absent.

  " A Dutchman named Claus van Clynne was to meet me on the road tonight and failed to turn up. It's likely he's still with Putnam. You'll know him if you see him — he's as fat as a pregnant sow and complains twice as much. He has a red beard that fills much of his chin and chest besides; he pulls it whenever he thinks over a knotty problem, which is often. He's a good man, though; you can trust him. "

  " I doubt I would ever trust a Dutchman."

  " Trust no one else," said Jake sternly. " If you do meet up with him, tell him to go to Albany immediately. He'll recognize the gun as well."

  " You've sang with him, too? "

  " That is an experience almost too terrible to imagine," said Jake. A dim twilight was starting to invade the darkness; he could see her face clearly.

  Would she succeed? A great deal depended on her getting to Putnam. Jake would do his best to sabotage the Tory efforts from inside their camp, but the guard must be alerted in case he failed. Her information would aid them greatly, especially as it foretold when the assault would be launched, and warned Putnam to guard Busch's farm, where Jake thought the assault would be launched from.

  Freedom often calls upon common folk to play a noble role in Her struggle. Had it not been for the war — had it not been for her fortuitous meeting with Jake — this young woman would have spent her life as a simple housewife, bearing life's commonplace dangers with her quiet courage.

  Now she would have to prove herself the equal of Paul Revere's midnight army, the fifty or sixty anonymous men and women whom the silversmith had rallied to save Concord and Lexington. Jake reached up to give her a kiss of encouragement. While he meant to aim for her cheek, she turned her lips toward him; they met in a warm, lingering moment fired by the passion of a shared cause.

  " Hurry now," he told her, patting the horse's bare back. " Don't fail me."

  " I won't," she said, spurring the steed away.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Wherein, Jake finds it necessary to rout the American forces.

  Jake proceeded back to jail at a half-trot; even so, the going took longer than the coming. By the time he arrived it was little more than an hour before dawn.

  Along the way, the spy pondered the pending operation to liberate the Tory prisoners. It was bound to put the American soldiers standing guard at risk, and could very well prove fatal to them.

  The greater good of protecting the chain must be served, of course, but Lieutenant Colonel Jake Gibbs was not the sort of officer who could make cold calculations of human lives so blithely. He therefore decided to try to find some way of removing the militia guards from harm's way before the assault was launched.

  Given the circumstances of his escape, Jake had hopes that whatever guards had been posted would still be sleeping upon his return. This would make his course an easy one — each man could be trussed and trundled off to the woods while still dozing, assuming Jake could find their nap nooks.

  Alas, an officer had made the rounds of the watch sometime after Jake's departure. As he cut through the barnyard across from the church, the patriot spy saw that the sentry whom he had landed on was now wide awake and pacing angrily in front of the church. The fellow's previous companion, Sleep, had been replaced by a much younger man shouldering a musket. The pair were grumbling loudly about their lieutenant, complaining about his threats and suspicious nature.

  Jake retreated to regroup. His mental processes received a sudden jolt when, turning the corner of the barn, he smacked into another soldier, a short, frailish fellow of fifty-odd years who fell back in surprise.

  "Excuse me," said Jake quickly, extending his left hand to help up the poor man — and then smashing him across the face with his right.

  He grabbed his musket and hunkered down as he heard footsteps in the road; the distance between the church and barn was only two or three rods, and even the most precursory march could cover the twenty or thirty yards in a few seconds. But the guard did not come around the back, and Jake soon heard the steps walking the other way.

  The fact that these militiamen had no set uniform, save the simple white straps crossing their chests and holding up a sack apiece, meant it would be easy enough to impersonate one. Jake took off
the older man's straps and bags, then grabbed his powder horn as well. But he decided against stealing his long coat, as it would most likely have left the pallid-looking militiaman to face the rest of his call-up without one. Tying the soldier's hands with a piece of rawhide he found in the sack, Jake pulled off one of the man's boots, intending to gag him with his sock. But the sight of the bare heel and toes peeking out from the torn material moved him to pity, and he replaced the boot and pulled the man to the edge of the woods instead.

  As far as Jake could discover creeping around the barn, the only other soldiers in the vicinity were the two fellows in the front of the church. Their patrol was haphazard, serving mostly to vent their emotion at the officer whose scolding had kept them from a good night's sleep. The man Jake had jumped earlier now expressed the opinion that the lieutenant had thrashed him on the head and shoulders before waking him, and cursed the man for denying it.

  The men's oaths suggested an easy ploy — Jake would arrive cursing as well, and claim that the lieutenant had ordered him to replace them. But he worried they might not take the bait, and having neglected their duty before, might seek to make up for it now by asking a copious amount of questions. He therefore decided to launch a supplementary plan to draw their attention away — a barn fire. Given that he had recently worked that ploy to advantage at Stoneman's — intentionally or not, one couldn't fuss with the results — the patriot spy felt somewhat confident it would work here.

  The only inconvenience was the poor design of the structure, which concentrated all openings at the front of the road, in full view of the soldiers.

  Jake waited until both men were turned in the opposite direction and then scampered into the barn through a narrow doorway without being seen.

  Almost without being seen. For he had no sooner ducked from the dim twilight of the roadway to the utter darkness of the barn's interior when he heard a shout from the street.

  Somewhat indistinct, the words were followed by the more definite sound of a pair of boots running in his direction. Jake took a step backwards into the bowels of the large structure, only to feel something sharp and pointed in his back. Instinctively, he dropped the musket and put up his hands — then ducked in a flash, diving to the ground in case there was a loaded gun attached to the bayonet that had stuck him.

  Not precisely. As he rolled over to kick his assailant, Jake looked up into the puzzled eyes of a large but tranquil ox. It curled its tongue with a question, yawned, and shook its head. Two dozen of its fellows swung their tails in sympathy.

  Jake scooped up the old man's musket and pushed his way between the animals as the militiaman arrived.

  "Out, you thief, I know you're in there!" called one of the guards. "You Tory cowboys won't be stealing any of the town's oxen tonight, I promise you."

  The men murmured in consultation outside, revealing their names as Harrold and Daniel, but otherwise offered little that was useful to Jake. He slipped to the back of the ox pack and waited for the guards' next move.

  A sound at the large center door alerted him to their plans, and suggested a counterattack. By the time the door swung open, Jake had the oxen mustered and pressing forward.

  A stampede it wasn't. But the soldiers had their hands full trying to contain the large, lumbering creatures, and found it impossible to close the door before three or four escaped. This engendered some arguing as the men found it necessary to split up, one entering the barn and the other going after the beasts. It also gave Jake the opportunity to climb to the second floor loft.

  Leaving his musket in the straw, the patriot jumped down onto Daniel's back as he came into the barn, thinking to ride him to the ground and quickly knock him out.

  Jake would have had a better chance with one of the oxen, and in fact, might be forgiven for thinking he had landed on one. Daniel Higgins was an immense nineteen-year-old, and his first reaction to Jake's assault was a noncommittal shrug, as if he did not realize he'd been tackled. This was followed by a violent shake and shudder, as Jake grabbed hold of his throat with one arm and pummeled the side of his head with the other. The man began screaming for help — Jake would have been justified in making a similar plea — and pitched forward so quickly that the patriot spy flew forward onto the ground.

  The blow did not hurt him, though the smear of ox dung on his face when he landed was nearly incapacitating. Jake just barely rolled out of the way as Daniel charged forward, and watched with some satisfaction as the man slipped on the flattened ox turd himself.

  It took two kicks to the side of Daniel's head to knock him senseless. Jake had just picked up the man's musket when he heard a sound behind him. He swung around and saw the other militiaman entering the barn, rifle in hand.

  There was a split second of opportunity before the man could bring his gun to bear. But Jake could no more shoot a member of his army than he could shoot himself, even for the greater good of the Cause. He threw down the weapon and stood away from the fallen soldier. "What have you done to Daniel?" "Set him to dreaming what he'll do after the war," said Jake. "But otherwise he's fine." "Don't be smart." The militiaman pointed his rifle at him menacingly. "Move away from the gun, you coward." "Coward? I thought it took a lot of bravery to throw down my gun. I could easily have killed you, Harrold." A confused expression grew on the militiaman's face. "Who are you?" he asked. "I don't look familiar to you?" "Not at all." "Would you know your own brother?" Jake took a step forward. The militiaman pointed his rifle in the approximate direction of Jake's heart. "You're not my brother."

  "I asked only if you would know him. Sometimes, the circumstances of our surroundings can be so different that the familiar appears strange."

  "This is a trick."

  "A trick? Why do you think I didn't kill you?"

  "You have your reasons, I suspect." Harrold watched as Jake slowly circled around toward the barn door. "I'm not going to let you run out of here." "You really don't remember me? Not at all?" "Are you that old countryman who deserted the unit when we were called last month?" "Do I look like a deserter?"

  Harrold hesitated, but then shook his head. In all this time, he had kept his finger firmly on the trigger, and for all his confusion, had not quite dropped his aim. A sudden noise, even a sharp movement, might cause him to fire — and shorten Jake Gibbs's career considerably. "You're not in our militia." "Think back, Harrold, think back to your youth." "You run out that door, I'll shoot you, I swear."

  But Jake's object was not to run out the door — it was to slap it closed and send the interior into pitch-black darkness. He dove against the heavy door the way a child jumps into a snow pile. The long irons hinges creaked in anger, but swung back nevertheless, shutting out the dim twilight.

  As Jake hit the ground, he heard the stinging bee of the bullet pass over his head.

  "You shouldn't have fired, Harrold. First rule of warfare, never shoot at what you can't see."

  But Jake's eyes were no better adapted to the dimness than the militiaman's. He rolled forward, abruptly bouncing into a wall. As he got to his feet, he realized Harrold had gotten a bead on him and charged forward; Jake just managed to jump away as the militiaman lunged.

  The crack Harrold's head took off the wall must have been severe, but it didn't stop him — he flailed with his rifle, using it as a club, and caught Jake in the side of the head. Jake ate straw and dirt for a moment, then caught a sharp blow to his ribs before managing to roll away.

  This was just the sort of impromptu contest the American militia did well in. Put them in line and drill them until the corn sprouted, and no more than a third would follow the commands during a set-piece battle. But give them an ambush, let them show initiative, and they were strong foes indeed.

  Unlike General Percy, the man who led the redcoat retreat from Lexington and Concord, Jake was not about to play into the militia's hands by retreating. Instead, he began a spirited counterattack, pulling at Harrold's leg and catching him off-balance. He knocked the fellow to the gro
und, where they began to wrestle for an advantage amid the legs of the cattle, who every so often added a kick of annoyance at being disturbed.

  Now the reader will recall that Jake Gibbs is a tall, strongly-built man just past twenty-three; in his stocking feet he stands two inches beyond six feet, and every inch of his frame is well supported by muscle. His opponent, in his stocking feet, came no higher than Jake's collarbone; he liked to tip the bottle at night, and in truth had shied away from brawling ever since receiving a bloody nose as a nine-year-old. But here was a man who was fighting for his country; Jake would have had an easier time grappling with a German giant brought across the ocean to pay his prince's debts. Certainly he wished he was, for then he might have fought with a freer hand. Here he had to fight hard enough to stop the well-motivated patriot, yet not so hard that he would cause him permanent harm.

  Harrold grabbed Jake by the throat and refused to let go, even as Jake rolled him onto his back and began pounding his head against the hard-packed floor. The man's grip tightened and tightened, and Jake began to fear that he would have the fellow's brains splattered across the floor before winning his freedom.

  Finally the pounding took its toll, and Jake felt Harrold's grip loosening. He gave one more smash and jumped up, half expecting the militiaman to bolt up after him. But Harrold finally had been knocked senseless; his troubled breathing foretold a severe headache when he awoke.

  Jake quickly went to the door; there were no reinforcements in sight. He tied the two unconscious militiamen up with leather straps and hauled them to the far wall, fastening them to a ring there. The oxen, confused by the activity, were pulled back inside their pen, and Jake found five seconds to tuck his shirt in his pants before returning to prison.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Wherein, Claus van Clynne is guest of honor at a bloodletting, and Rose unhoops herself.