Forrest uttered an angry grunt.
“You know somethin’ we don’t, sir?” Bell asked in a whisper as an eerie silence shrouded the wagon and its surroundings.
“Not a damn thing and I ain’t ready to move until I know more than that.”
“Makes sense!” Rhett hissed anxiously.
“Ass kisser from way back,” Forrest growled.
Seward giggled. “Only direction to do it from.”
“You men in there? You lousy spies!”
From the sharpness of the tone and the way in which the voice picked up a hint of an echo, Hedges guessed the wagon had been halted between high stone walls.
“We hear you, Reb!” Forrest yelled.
Hedges became tense, leaning forward from the bench seat, his muscles knotting for a dive to the wagon bed. From Forrest’s tone of voice, he guessed the sergeant was not yet fully committed to a crash-out. But he wasn’t prepared to trust the man’s impulses. Hedges’ own voice was little more than a hissed vibration in the stale air, fetid with the odors of bad breath and the unwashed body stink of sweating tension and fear.
“Any man not ready to die, hit the floor.”
“The door’s gonna be opened!” the voice shouted from outside the wagon. “Just one man even looks like giving trouble, you’re all cold meat.”
Two pairs of heels clattered on the cobbles, approaching the rear of the wagon. Keys scraped in padlocks, chains rattled and bolts screeched in their brackets.
“Why’s the captain always so goddamn right, Frank?” Seward whined softly.
“Told you before, Billy,” the sergeant muttered sourly. “Cause he knows that as soon as he calls a wrong shot, he’s in the firin’ line.”
Relieved that he was not to face a hail of bullets, Rhett’s spirits had risen. “Makes it a matter of life and death for Mr. Hedges,” he said with a hollow laugh.
The door folded open and the Union troopers in a motley array of civilian garb blinked against the comparative brightness of the steadily burning oil lamps. As their eyes adjusted to the light level their other senses were heightened. They felt the dampness and chill of the early morning mist cooling the sweat on their flesh. They smelled the tangy dankness of the nearby river. And they heard the steady trickling of running water.
“Ain’t none of us got the choice no more,” Bell growled miserably as he surveyed the view from the wagon. “All gonna get it in the neck.”
“Out slowly, one at a time, men on my right first.”
The order made Hedges the first man to step from the wagon and he complied to the letter, easing up from the hard bench, stretching taut muscles and slouching down the two steps on to the damp cobbles. But the nonchalant obedience was a paper-thin protective shell. Just beneath the surface he was physically poised and mentally alert to lunge into lightning action if the opportunity was presented. But the clear blue eyes flashing from side to side beneath the hooded lids saw no such chance.
The wagon was halted at the centre of a large courtyard. It had not been turned after entering the prison so that, as the troopers emerged from the wagon, they saw the thirty foot high front wall with a pair of large double gates at a central point. A railed catwalk ran along the inside of the wall, six feet from the top. There was a wooden cabin at each corner and a larger one overlooking the gates. Lamps burned in each and spilled light through the slitted gunports, to glint on the rifle barrels angled down towards the wagon.
Fifteen more Spencer rifles covered the disembarking prisoners. Ten were trained upon them by a line of drab-brown uniformed prison guards positioned midway between the wagon and the gate. Five were aimed from the shoulders of the military escort aligned at one side. The lieutenant and the prison governor stood at the other side, showing no weapons.
“He sure in hell was right this time,” Hal Douglas muttered as he took his place at the end of the line of prisoners and raked his frightened eyes over the grim faces of the riflemen. Then he craned around to look at the high front wall and the towering cell blocks enclosing the courtyard at the sides and rear.
“No talking!” the dour-faced sergeant at the head of the line of Rebel soldiers snapped as the lieutenant handed the execution warrants to the governor.
“Up your ass, Reb!” Forrest snarled at him. “We’re signed and sealed to die anyhow. You figure to leather our butts before we swing if we ain’t good boys?”
The grey-uniformed sergeant scowled.
“Talk about somethin’ else, Frank,” Billy Seward urged with a broad grin. “Bob’s gettin’ all stirred up. You know how he feels about asses and butts and stuff like that.”
“No, Billy,” Forrest drawled. “I don’t know how he feels. I ain’t never let him get that close to me.”
Scott and Bell laughed.
Hedges, Rhett and Douglas ignored the mixture of bravado and hollow-humored reaction to the seemingly hopeless plight in which the men found themselves. The New Englander and the corporal continued to survey their surroundings with gaunt eyes. Hedges retained his veneer of easy acceptance while he completed a detailed examination of the prison. In addition to the lamps in the guard cabins, other shafts of light sprang from windows here and there in the cell blocks. The moon was masked by the white mist blanketing the night sky but there was ample light to show that the courtyard offered no means of escape. Even when the military escort had been withdrawn and the line of prison guards dispersed, the men in the catwalk cabins would not be the only ones watching the courtyard. For other riflemen—two at each side and four at the rear—patrolled the flat roofs of the cell blocks: dark, specter-like silhouettes against the pale vapor rolling across the prison from the river.
“Okay, you murderin’ bastards. The soldier-boy’s give me the papers so you all belong to me now.” The governor glowered at the loose-knit, lounging group of prisoners. He was a big man, barrel-chested, bulging gutted and with a squarish head from which his dark eyes looked out with a cruel glint. He was about fifty.
“Richard Lovelace was out of his tiny mind,” Rhett muttered after completing a final fearful-eyed survey of his surroundings.
“Told you, Frank,” Seward reminded lightly. “All that ass talk’s made Bob feverish.”
“Get a medic,” Forrest taunted the Rebel sergeant. “Our buddy’s come over queer.”
The Rebel seemed about to spit, but checked it. “Hope it ain’t nothin’ fatal,” he rasped. “I wanna see him hang.”
“Cheer up, Bob,” Forrest said, beaming at the lanky New Englander. “Could be a gay night after all. Guy here wants to see the way you hang.”
“Go to hell!” Rhett snarled at Forrest.
“He will,” the sergeant said, with a grin of his own, “In good company.”
“That man!” the governor roared. He thrust forward a rock steady arm, the index finger pointing at Rhett. “Come here!”
“Who, me?” Rhett asked tremulously.
At a nod from the lieutenant, the soldiers ported their arms, then swung to the side and moved to the front of the wagon.
“Who the hell do you think I mean when I’m pointing at you?” the governor bellowed.
The soldiers climbed hurriedly up on to the wagon, as if anxious to get away from the dank-smelling prison.
“Captain?” Rhett pleaded shrilly.
“No doubt about it,” Hedges told him evenly. “The man definitely wants you.”
The wagon jerked forward and was steered in a tight turn, the open rear door flapping and banging. A prison guard moved out of the shadows at the foot of the high wall. Rhett inched forward nervously as the guard swung wide the big gates. The wagon rolled through on to the street and the gates swung shut. There was an awesome finality about the sound of them closing together. Rhett halted three feet in front of the governor and the big, ugly man lowered his arm to his side.
“One of them soldier boys said no noise,” the governor said to Rhett. “Reason he ain’t no higher than a sergeant is that he can maybe give o
rders, but he ain’t so hot at seein’ them carried out.”
“Weren’t only me,” Rhett whined, shooting a terrified glance over his shoulder.
The knot of prisoners, exposed in the centre of the courtyard without the solid bulk of the wagon behind them, were somehow reduced in stature by the large expanse of cobblestones around them and the towering walls which trapped them. They looked as helplessly vulnerable as they were. And their expressions, ranging from fearful to blank, told Rhett he was the most pathetically situated of them all. Alone and not about to receive support. The sweat of terror dripped from Rhett’s forehead into his eyes. But he was too frightened to move to rub away the stinging moisture.
“I’m a governor,” the big, mean-faced man went on, his tone almost conversational now. “Top hand inside these walls. Got to be that by makin’ damn sure orders were obeyed.”
Rhett was trembling with fear. The other prisoner’s saw his hands were clutched together behind his back. But, even locked thus, they shook uncontrollably.
“Not just my own orders, you understand. In my prison, anyone in authority—and that means anyone who ain’t a prisoner—gets his orders obeyed. Okay?”
Rhett tried to speak, but the words got caught in his fear-constructed throat. He pumped his head several times. The governor shook his.
“I don’t reckon you do, Yankee. Need a lesson. You won’t be alive to remember it for much, so I’ll keep it short.”
As he spoke, he took a step forward, his right hand swinging upwards again. But there was no pointing finger this time. All the fingers were curled to form a claw—which sank a vicious hold on to Rhett’s thin shoulder. The New Englander’s cry of alarm emerged as a gurgle. Then the governor raised his left arm and began to slap Rhett across the cheeks. Palm and back of the hand. Not hard. Just enough to erupt a sharp crack at each contact. But the mild beating was designed only as a diversion to hold Rhett’s humiliated attention. The real damage was done by the governor’s left knee. He snapped it up hard and fast and jerked Rhett closer to him at the same moment. The kneecap slammed into the victim’s groin and this time there was no obstacle to the scream. White hot agony swamped fear and Rhett’s airways were burst wide open to broadcast the high, thin shrillness that exploded inside him.
Instinctively, his body tried to fold, but the grip on his shoulder held him upright. The slapping stopped and the hand was withdrawn and bunched into a fist. The first shot forward and the scream was curtailed. The grip on Rhett’s shoulder was released and he staggered backwards, hands flying up from his lower stomach to clasp at this throat. Gagging from the blow to his windpipe, Rhett tripped over his own feet and fell hard to the cobbles in front of the other Union troopers. Fighting for breath, his body writhed, with legs flailing, as if to keep himself from drowning in the waves of pain washing over him.
The governor eyed the other prisoners, licking his lips with relish and not speaking until the dry retching sounds from Rhett’s tortured throat had subsided to pitiful whimpers. Then. “School don’t have to be out if any of you other Yankees want to do some learnin’.”
From the corner of his eye, Hedges saw that Seward’s mouth was opening to form the first word of an embittered retort. He took a step forward, to crouch down beside the pain-wracked form of Rhett. As he did so, he sank the heel of a boot hard on to Seward’s toecap. The youngster yelled in pain.
“One cripple’s more than enough to carry out of here,” the Captain rasped from the side of his mouth.
“No takers?” the governor snapped, then gave a harsh laugh. “So pick up that heap of garbage and let’s move.”
“You figure there’s a way outta here, Captain?” Forrest muttered as he helped to load Rhett’s limp form on to Hedges’ shoulder. “Heard what you told Billy.”
“We cracked Andersonville,” Hedges reminded softly.*
(*See—Edge: The Blue, The Grey And The Red.)
“Piece of cake compared to this rock pile.” Forrest growled, glancing around grimly at the high stone walls enclosing them.
“Different kind of cake is all,” Hedges murmured and raised a hand to touch the back of his neck beneath the long hair. “Needs to be sliced a different way.”
Forrest showed the trace of an evil grin as he recognized the action: a sign that when they were searched the concealed razor had been overlooked.
“Right, the doorway in the rear corner!” the governor barked. “Move it.”
He went to the head of the column and the guards flanked the prisoners as they shuffled forward across the cobblestones. Forrest was the last man in the line with Hedges in front of him, rigidly upright in his gait despite the burden of Rhett. The New Englander groaned, surfacing from his unconsciousness.
“Go to sleep again, you stupid bastard,” Forrest muttered. “We were talkin’ about rock cake. Not friggin’ fruit cake.”
* * *
HEADING into the wind-driven rain, Luke held down the pace on the return to Paradise. The men talked sporadically, prefixing each given name with the title “angel”. Luke was the only one referred to as “arch angel”.
Riding at the rear of the twin column, right hand palmed over the butt of the holstered Colt, Edge soon gave up trying to overhear what was said. Against the howl of the wind and hiss of the rain, counterpointed by the rushing sounds of the stream, he could not discern enough isolated words to make sense of the desultory conversations.
Beyond the mouth of the gorge, the wind veered and swirled so that the rain was not constantly hurled into the faces of the riders. Visibility lengthened and was reduced by turns as the teeming downpour swirled and billowed like some enormous grey curtain.
“You guys can certainly pray up a storm,” the half-breed yelled as he held on his hat against the violent tug of the wind. “Any chance of getting through the word for a let-up?”
“Do not mock us.” The speaker was a gaunt-faced man named ‘Angel Angus who rode immediately ahead of Edge at the rear of the left hand file. His voice was thick with a Scottish accent unmarred by American drawl. He turned in the saddle to glare back at Edge. “The sky was bright when we gave the sinners unto the mercy of the Lord.”
“For doing what?” the half-breed asked, his hooded eyes glancing swiftly from left to right. To the east the stream had widened to fifty feet, rushing forward with a frenetic energy, muddy brown along a depth that was impossible to gauge. On the western slope of the valley, the trees grew thick and impenetrable, spreading down on to level ground.
“The two sinners you freed were found guilty of making obscene suggestions to female angels,” Angus replied. “The sinner Patrick O’Rerry was condemned for laying lascivious hands upon the same females.”
“The sinners were mindless with the Devil’s brew,” a stocky, acne-skinned man named Angel Francis augmented earnestly. “Foul-tongued and reeling. Such men have never entered Paradise before.”
“Hell’s just got be overcrowded,” Edge said coolly.
Francis chose to ignore the half-breed’s wry comment. “Arch Angel Luke was adamant the sinner O’Rerry should perish from execution rock,” he went on. “But he was unsure how to punish the other two. In his wisdom, he sought the counsel of the Lord, We prayed and the rains came.”
“And the Devil’s agent interrupted the work of the Lord,” Angus thundered. “Prophet Thomas had a vision that mischief was afoot. That is why we rode hard for the gorge.”
Edge was not listening to the broad and oddly flat rantings of the Scotsman. The storm was slackening, the wind dropping then stopping altogether so that the rain pelted straight down for a while. Then, overhead, the clouds began to roll rather than scud and the dark streaks were wisped away to leave the sky higher, lighter and drier. The whole valley came into long, wide view. Ahead it was bending towards the north-west and broadening, the river following the line of least resistance along its centre. Then, as the group of riders completed the dog-leg turn, the rain stopped altogether and the town of Paradise c
ame into view.
It was perched on a shallow slope a little way up the valley side, and from a distance looked much like any other small community in the timberland of the north-western territories. But, as Luke quickened the pace to a canter and the riders drew nearer, the half-breed was able to see the neat simplicity of the cluster of buildings. All of them were stoutly built of logs from the timber cleared from the site of the town. A single street ran up the slope and at the lower end was flanked by two long buildings. One was a barn and the other a stable block. The houses, which were little more than shacks only big enough to contain two rooms, were aligned at the sides of the street on higher ground, every one identical to its neighbor. Every building was single storey.
Spread out on the valley floor below the town was a wide area of productive land stretching to a construction site on the bank of the river. Fields of sprouting wheat, barley, potatoes and green vegetables exuded freshness after the rain storm. Beyond this patchwork of fields was a wide swath of verdant pastureland, fenced to keep a herd of Texas Longhorns off the growing crops.
To a man with more imagination than Edge—less of a realist—the fact that the sun suddenly shafted through a break in the cloud to bathe the town and farmland with bright yellow light ... such an occurrence might have appeared as a physical manifestation of heaven’s alliance with the Earthly Angels. But the half-breed merely sighed with relief as the cloud-break widened and the warmth of the sun’s rays reached him and began to dry his clothing.
“Is it not a beautiful place to die?” Angus proclaimed earnestly as the pace slackened to a walk and the riders began moving along a pebble-surfaced trail between the fields.
“No place is that if a man ain’t ready,” Edge muttered as he looked across the construction site which was the starting point of the trail. It was an area some five hundred feet by a hundred, covered with newly spread cement and enclosed by a stone wall of irregular height—no more than ten feet tall at its highest point. There was a wide gap at the north end.
EDGE: Blood Run (Edge series Book 14) Page 3
