Accidental Warrior: The Unlikely Tale of Bloody Hal

by Colin Alexander

  Anderson’s eyes narrowed. “A little girl could learn to use it, if she had a prop for the barrel. What’s this? Baby girl fat?” He grabbed Hal’s forearm and squeezed hard.

  Hal ripped his arm out of the grip. His own anger was beginning to rise. Okay, I’m a sexist, not that Anderson would know or care what that is. “Give me the damned rifle.”

  “Better.”

  Hal grounded the butt so that the rifle was vertical, then took the cartridge Anderson held out. He bit and tried to rip the top off as Anderson had, but the paper would not yield.

  Anderson hooted. “Try harder, Granny!”

  Hal glared at him and bit down harder. Finally, the cartridge gave, leaving a bitter taste of gunpowder in his mouth. When he went to pour the contents into the barrel, a third of it spilled out on the ground. Hal was sweating heavily by the time he raised the rifle to his shoulder. The tree seemed to swim back and forth in front of the sight. He tried to ignore the motion, gritted his teeth and pulled the trigger. The recoil slammed back into his shoulder again. The tree, again, was untouched.

  “Pitiful,” Anderson said.

  “God dammit!” Hal screamed. “This thing is stupid! Any idiot with a bow and arrow can kill you five times over while you’re fumbling around the muzzle.”

  “You think so, do you?” Anderson’s icy tone put an end to Hal’s outburst. “You listen to me, you little snot. I expect a soldier to get off two shots a minute, three if he’s really good. He can shoot as fast as an archer and farther than an archer if he’s got a rifle, he’s always got more ammunition than an archer has arrows and finally, in spite of your clumsiness, anyone can learn to shoot a God damned hell of a lot faster than you can learn to be good with a bow and arrow. Now, you will learn to use it.” Anderson pulled a box of cartridges from the wagon and dropped it at Hal’s feet. “Come find me when you hit the tree.” He stalked off.

  Hal never did go to find Anderson. When the Englishman came back an hour later, he found Hal exactly where he had left him. The snow around Hal was trampled now and the cartridge box was half empty. Anderson glanced into the box and saw that the number of missing cartridges matched the number of shots that had echoed through the camp.

  “Did you hit the tree?”

  “No.” Hal felt miserable. In fact, he felt like crying. He was certain that his shoulder was solid purple under his shirt.

  “Yeah. Looks like the tree stood up to you pretty good.”

  “Look, don’t rub it in,” Hal said. “I know how bad I am. God damn it, why don’t you have any guns that load back here?” He slapped the back of the barrel. “I still might not hit anything, but it would be easier to miss.”

  It took a moment for Hal to realize that Anderson was staring at him with his mouth open. “How do you know about breechloaders?” he demanded.

  “What?” Once again, Hal saw that he had said something he should not have said. “Just something I heard from somebody. That’s all.”

  Anderson grunted, unconvinced. “I didn’t think anybody up here had heard about ’em. Not yet. I went with Captain Hayry in the spring down to Virginia. I saw some there.” There was longing in his voice. “They got the idea from the Spanish in the Indies, I heard. Breechloading rifles; some hold more than one shot. You don’t need to stand up to load them. Not many around now and even less ammunition for them, but there will be. Christ, once there’s enough of them around, we might as well beat our swords into ploughshares because we’ll never get close enough to kill anybody with them. That’s what Captain Hayry says, anyway. It’ll be a while, though. We’ll fight the next war the old-fashioned way.”

  “Next war?”

  “Shit, Woodsey, where’ve you been hiding? The Holier-than-thous in Boston are spoiling for a fight. Massachusetts used to control the land in the north all the way to the east bank of the Hudson, until the French came in at the end of the Ten Years War back in the nineteen fifties and sixties and they got pushed back east into the Green Mountains. They’re still looking west across the Hudson. Trust me on that. Hell, they’d be in Nieuw Amsterdam now except they had a revolt of their own the same time the Provis tossed the governor. Things is, the Provis are getting weaker, not stronger, but Nya Sverige will be damned in hell before they let a unit of Massachusetts Bay Colony Regulars into the port of Nieuw Amsterdam, or anywhere west of the Hudson. Sure, we’ll have another war. And each war, the armies are bigger—big standing armies now even before the militia call-ups—and the weapons are better. Each one’s a bloodier mess than the one before. But”—he looked up—“we’re not about to have a war today. Come on, Woodsey, Hayry’s got another job for us.”

  Hayry’s other job was one Hal would have preferred to avoid, even if it meant going back to the rifle. Den Ouden had finally finished the new wheels for the wagons. Unfortunately, in order to take the old wheels off and put the new ones on, the wagons had to be unloaded. Plenty of men were there to help, but there seemed to be an infinite number of boxes, chests and crates with only one thing in common: they were all heavy. Even the hay bales carried along for the horses were larger and heavier than the ones Hal was accustomed to. At the bottom of each wagon lay large crates of plain wood that were heavier than everything else. With Hal’s first tug at the first box, his already-sore shoulder began to throb. By the time the contents of the wagons were stacked in neat piles on the snowy ground, he couldn’t raise his arm above his shoulder. It would not have surprised him if the arm had simply fallen off.

  The work stopped while den Ouden and an assistant changed the wheels, and Hal, soaked in sweat, began to chill. Of course, once the new wheels were on, Hayry wanted the wagons re-loaded as fast as possible. Hal discovered that in addition to the chill, the break had allowed his shoulder to stiffen. It felt like there were twice as many crates to load as to unload.

  Finally, Gustavus came out from the inn to inspect the wagons with Hayry. They pulled on the rims and pushed on the spokes. Each wagon was moved a short distance while they stared at the wheels. Then they pulled at their chins and frowned at the wheels. They held a brief conversation that ended with Gustavus nodding vigorously. Den Ouden’s wheels would serve. By that time, however, it was too late in the day to set out. Hayry gave the order for them to return to the campsite or the inn for another night.

  He tapped Hal on the arm. “How do you find our little troop?”

  “It’s fine,” Hal answered. “I just don’t think I’ll ever make a marksman.” He experimented with rotating his arm and tried not to wince.

  Hayry frowned. “You need to work on it. You also need to work on remembering to say ‘Kapten Hayry’.” His tone, however, was not as severe as his face. “However, that’s all Sergeant Anderson’s job. Tewes was out of town this morning, but he is back now. They did burn the Johnson farm and I suspect they killed everyone they found. When he got back, he was looking for you.”

  Hal shuddered. “What do I do?” he asked, then added, “Kapten Hayry,” when Hayry frowned again.

  “Stay in the campsite,” Hayry told him. “Don’t leave it for any reason. Tewes is stupid enough to believe you are working with the woodsrangers, but not so stupid as to invade our camp and take a man in Gustavus’ service. However, if you were caught outside the camp, especially if no one else was around, it might be a different story.” Hayry shrugged. “Neither I nor Gustavus would believe that you would run off and disappear, which is the story we’d hear, but there wouldn’t be much we could do about it either. A word to the wise,” Hayry finished.

  Hal was shivering after Hayry left, and it had nothing to do with the cold. How had he gotten himself into this mess?

  Other than the one night with Pyke before they rode to Gap, Hal could not remember ever spending a night outdoors, certainly not in the winter. The campfires threw off enough heat to keep him warm, but every time he turned his head away from the fire, the cold air reminded him it was December. The blankets he rolled up in were no substitute for a mattress, not even f
or the lumpy one back in his room at the inn. Hanging over all the discomforts like a rain cloud was the threat of Tewes. In the stillness of the night, Hayry’s warning made the danger real and immediate. Hayry might have been confident that Tewes would not chance a confrontation with Gustavus, but might his men sneak into the camp, kidnap Hal, and leave only an empty blanket roll for the Swedes to find in the morning?

  Exhausted as he was, Hal fought sleep, listening for every footstep, every cracking twig, anything that might signal someone was coming toward him. Every time he dozed, he would wake in a panic, fearing that someone was creeping up on him. It made for a long night.

  14

  Into the Woods

  DAYLIGHT FOUND HAL still in the camp, whole and unmolested. Having hardly slept, however, he was even more tired than he had been the day before. When he sat up, his shoulder reminded him of yesterday’s exertions. It could not have felt worse if Anderson had spent the afternoon kicking him with his heavy boots on. And now that worthy was striding through the camp, bellowing for everyone to get up.

  “Come on, come on, you lazy sons of poxy lice-ridden whores! Break camp! We’re riding out today!” From somewhere by the wagons, a horn sounded, just in case anyone hadn’t heard Anderson.

  The effect on the camp was startling. Men seemed to pop out of the ground and rush around in all directions. In minutes, the tents were down and the fires were out. Hal just rolled up his blanket and stood by it, not knowing what else to do. Anderson did not leave him in limbo very long.

  “Christianson!” he yelled. “Get over here!”

  Hal picked up his sack and his blanket roll and ran over to where Anderson was standing.

  “Well, Woodsey, you’re still here,” Anderson said. “I suppose that’s something. Now, you answer me straight. When you signed up, did you think we were just going to give you a horse so you could go charging around like some damned dragoon?”

  Hal’s heart sank. In the confusion and excitement of the last two days, he had forgotten that Gustavus’ troopers were mounted. “No, I didn’t.”

  “Good.” Anderson snorted. Apparently, that had been the right answer. “First, we don’t have horses for everybody, second, even if we did, we need drivers and guards on the wagons and, third, even if we didn’t, cavalry is something you earn. Do you have a problem riding on a wagon?”

  “No, not at all.” Hal wanted to say that, given a chance, he would never mount a horse again, but the way Anderson was making a big deal out of riding, it didn’t seem like a good idea.

  Anderson relaxed. He must have expected an argument. “That’s good, Woodsey, real good. Now, listen to me. Gustavus will ride by the first wagon. Johanna’s coach is second. You ride with the driver on the third. His job is to keep close to the coach, your job is to watch for trouble. There’s a spare sword in the wagon. Buckle it on. There’s a rifle for you, too, and let’s both pray to God that you don’t need to scare a real woodsranger with it. Any questions?”

  “No,” said Hal.

  By the time Hal walked from the rapidly vanishing camp to the wagons, the drivers were already moving into a line. Each of the seven wagons held a driver and one or two guards. The rest of Gustavus’ men were mounted and divided into two groups, taking position on each side of the wagon train. Gustavus was at the front, his black stallion pacing back and forth across the road, eager to be off. There was already a wagon lined up behind Johanna’s coach and the lead wagon. Hal ran to it and pulled himself up onto the buckboard beside the driver. He was right behind Johanna’s coach, but, the way it was built, he couldn’t even get a glimpse of her. It occurred to him then, that a journeyman soldier might not have any greater opportunity to speak with the boss’s daughter than a tavern boy. It was a discouraging thought.

  The driver next to him gave his name as Olaf, but was unwilling to carry the conversation beyond that. Hal sighed. It looked like it was going to be a long trip to Nieuw Amsterdam. Olaf cracked his whip and yelled at the horses. The wagon lurched over a rut hidden by the snow and, for an instant, Hal thought den Ouden’s new wheel was going to break. It held together, though, while the wagon began to squish through the muddy snow.

  The sword Anderson had mentioned was there, its belt looped around one of the staves that supported the wagon’s sides. It was nondescript, with no engraving on the blade, a simple cross guard and plain leather stretched around the hilt. It was light and looked to have been well-made, though. It had been cared for, too. There were none of the signs of neglect he had seen on Slade’s sword. The belt had been cut for someone of much greater girth, but he was able to fasten it comfortably at the last hole. The loose part of the belt was long enough to go halfway around his side, so he tucked the end under the fastened belt to keep it from flapping.

  The rifle was also there, lying on the boxes immediately behind the buckboard. “She’s already loaded,” Olaf said when Hal picked up the weapon.

  “Thanks.” Hal waited to see if Olaf would say anything else, but the driver just looked straight ahead over the horses and was silent again. That left Hal with his thoughts.

  Gap was now history, a closed door. He was a little surprised to feel regret at leaving John and even Old Jack, but Gap and the inn had never been more than a waystation. Even Pyke had said as much. In front of him was Nieuw Amsterdam, where he would find . . . what? An answer to where Magicals came from and how to send them back? He doubted it would be as simple as his dream of an old man with a magic wand.

  Hal sighed and turned to the rifle; he did not really want to hold it. On the other hand, it would look silly if he put it back with the boxes. Then he noticed a slot built into the side of the wagon. The butt of the rifle slid into it, leaving the barrel projecting up. From that position it could be easily grabbed and pulled out.

  Once he had taken care of the rifle, there was nothing else to do except sit there and watch their progress. Just east of Gap, the road ran through farmland similar to that elsewhere near the town. Land near the road was marked off by hedges or railings; farmhouses were set back from the road. Narrow lanes joined the road at irregular intervals, running off to more distant farms. The road along the stretch outside of town was a sloppy blend of snow and dirt. The horses would throw up clumps of it, high enough to hit the buckboards where the drivers and guards sat. By midmorning, Hal was liberally spattered.

  The farms began to peter out around midday. Where there had been one farm beginning right where the previous one left off, now they were interspersed with clumps of woods. Over the course of the afternoon, those clumps of woods grew larger so that the farms were isolated homesteads, rather than a community. Finally, by late afternoon, there were no more farms by the road. From the few tracks in the snowy road, Hal guessed this party was the largest group to take the road that far east in some days.

  The woods just stretched out forever. The trees were too dense, in spite of the leaves having fallen, to see very far in any direction. The road was little more than packed snow about two carts wide. Once they passed the last of the farms, Hayry sent several horsemen wide of the column. They rode through the trees just within sight of the road.

  “Does it go on like this all the way to Nieuw Amsterdam?” Hal asked.

  “Nah.” Olaf said. That surprised Hal, who had given up expecting answers. Olaf spit over the side before he continued. “The road between Gap and Nieuwmarkt is the longest stretch of woods between towns going east. West of Gap, of course, that’s another matter. Damn few towns out there at all.”

  Hal decided to take advantage of Olaf’s sudden talkativeness. “When do we get to the next town? Nieuwmarkt, is it?”

  “After dark. We left early enough that we’ll be through these woods before it’s full dark. We can follow the road in.”

  “Is there an inn like Slade’s?”

  Olaf shrugged. “Not really.”

  That was the limit of Olaf’s conversational interest, so they rode on in silence once again. The sameness of the woo
ds on all sides would have put Hal to sleep were it not for the jolting of the cart.

  Perhaps the carts were so heavily laden that they moved slower than expected, or perhaps Olaf’s concept of the distance to Nieuwmarkt was hazy, but twilight descended on them with no end to the woods in sight. As they bounced along through the failing light, Hal was startled by the sound of firecrackers in the woods. Next to him, there was a slapping sound. Olaf grunted at the noise. There were more popping sounds, followed by the shouts of men. Suddenly, Hal realized what he was hearing. Firecrackers? Those were gunshots!

  He turned to see that men on the other wagons were bringing rifles to their shoulders to fire back at targets among the trees, while others jumped to the ground with sword and pistol to join the mounted men as they charged into the trees. Screams came now from both the wagons and the woods.

  Hal did not move. He couldn’t. The rifle was right next to him, but it might as well have been a wooden stave for all the attention he gave it. Olaf wasn’t moving either. When Hal looked at him the reason was obvious. A ball had smashed in one temple. That had given rise to the grunt Hal had heard. He stared, frozen in place, as another ball struck the sideboard behind him. What was he supposed to do? If he fired the rifle he might hit a tree, or even one of Gustavus’ men. Where was Hayry? Where was Anderson?

  A man in the woods to the left was shouting over the combined noise of gunshots, the clash of swords and the screams of the wounded. It might have been Hayry; Hal couldn’t identify the voice or make out the words. Now men were coming out of the woods, toward the wagons. Men clad in leather. Woodsrangers. Gustavus’ guards were failing to hold them back.

  Three woodsrangers ran to the coach in front of him. The guard at the coach fired his rifle from the driver’s seat, but missed. The woodsrangers were on him before he could reload. He drew his sword, but to no avail. After a brief exchange of blows, his body fell to the ground. One of the attackers then turned his attention to the door of the coach, trying to force it open.