Rapscallion (49 page)

The
sound came again; a door bolt being released. The door swung open. Croker stood
on the threshold, a pistol in his hand. Sol, also armed, was behind him with
the lantern.

Hawkwood
saw it was morning. Beyond the doorway, grey light from outside was filtering
along the passageway.

Croker
jerked his head.
"You - lawman - on your feet, now!
The Frog stays put."

Hawkwood
remained where he was.

Croker
raised the pistol. "
You bleedin'
deaf? I said
outside! Mr Morgan wants to see you."

"I
don't think so," Hawkwood said. "I prefer it here."

Croker
moved forward. For the first time, he appeared to notice the candle flame.
"Would you look at that, Sol? They found themselves a light. Afraid of the
dark, were we? How sweet. Keep your eye on the Frog while I deal with his
nibs."

Croker
stepped further into the cellar, Sol close behind him, holding the lantern high
and looking wary.

The
cellar had always carried the smell from the kegs. It was nothing new, but it
wasn't until Croker looked down and noticed the lantern reflecting off the
wetness on the floor and the dampness on his boots that it occurred to him the
smell might be stronger than usual.

Which
was when Lasseur kicked over the opened brandy keg and Hawkwood touched the
candle to the edge of the puddle.

Croker
let out a yell as the floor and his boots and breeches erupted in blue tongues
of fire.

Hawkwood
knew the flames might not last long, depending on the strength of the liquor,
but he was counting on Croker's initial panic to give them the edge. Pushing
himself off the wall, Hawkwood slammed the knife towards Croker's throat. The
blade entered Croker's neck with devastating force. Croker's eyes widened with
astonishment. As he toppled backwards, the pistol still held fast in his hand,
Hawkwood swept the knife sideways before tugging it free. Gravity did the rest.

Sol
turned too late and screamed as Lasseur rose and smashed the empty bottle on to
the bridge of his nose. The lantern fell from his hand. As Sol went down,
Lasseur levered the pistol from his grip and swung his boot into Sol's crotch.
Sol joined Croker on the floor. Lasseur tossed the bottle aside, ignoring the
sound of breaking glass. Croker, prostrate, brandy-soaked and burning, tried to
bring his pistol to bear and died, choking on his own blood.

Placing
the knife inside his boot, Hawkwood prised the pistol from Croker's hand.
Already, the flames were dying.

Lasseur
was in the passageway. Hawkwood slammed the door shut and rammed the bolt home.
He caught up with Lasseur at the bottom of the stairs.

"If
we can get to the stables," Lasseur urged, "we can steal a couple of
horses."

But
Hawkwood shook his head. "No time. If any of Morgan's crew
are
in the stables we'd have to deal with them
and
saddle up. Even
if we managed to get clear, we'd still have to get past the pickets at the
gatehouse. We can assume Morgan's briefed his men. They'll hear us coming and
seal us in. So far, no one knows we've broken out. The longer we can keep it
that way, the better. We're better off going over the back wall and heading for
the woods."

"Morgan
has men on the perimeter."

"They'll
be spread out. We can deal with them."

Hawkwood
thought about the palisades. They were the only weak spots he'd seen. They
would have to cross open ground but when weighed against being on horseback in
full view and making noise, to Hawkwood's mind, the option still made more
sense. It wasn't much of a choice, either way.

Lasseur
contemplated Sol's pistol. "Then, let's hope this one's loaded."

They
halted at the top of the steps. The yard was empty. The stable doors stood
enticingly ajar. Hawkwood felt a twinge of doubt.

"Ready?"
Lasseur murmured.

He found he was talking to himself. Hawkwood was already on
the move.

"What
are Croker and Sol playing at, for Christ's sake?" Morgan shook his head,
half in anger,
half
in bafflement. "It would have
been quicker sending Del."

"We
should have gone ourselves," Pepper said. "At least, if there's a
mess, it'll be easier to clean the cellar than the carpet."

They
were in the main house. Morgan was at his desk. Pepper was leaning against the
hearth.

Morgan
thought about that. He stared at the carpet. What Pepper said made sense. He
nodded. "You're right." He picked up the blackthorn walking stick.
"Come on."

Pepper
retrieved a pistol from the table and followed Morgan out of the room.

They
headed for the stable yard.

There
was still no sign of either Croker or Sol en route. Morgan tried to ignore the
seeds of doubt germinating deep in his gut. He wondered whether Pepper was
experiencing concern, too. If he was, there was no sign. But that was the thing
with Pepper: he rarely showed any outward emotion. It didn't matter if the news
was good or bad, Pepper's expression hardly ever seemed to change.

The
two men crossed the yard and descended the cellar stairs.

It
was Pepper who sensed it first.

"What?"
Morgan said.

Pepper
raised the pistol and approached the cellar door. Cautiously, Morgan tugged
back the bolt and pulled the door open.

"God
damn it to hell!" Morgan's features distorted with rage as he stared down
at the carnage. His knuckles whitened around the blackthorn.
"Useless
bloody sods!"

Croker
lay on his back. His clothes were singed; his eyes were open and sightless.
There looked to be a lot of blood. Sol was on his side with his knees drawn up,
clutching his balls with blistered hands and whimpering. One eye was closed.
Blood and snot from his broken nose was dripping on to the floor. The cellar
reeked. Pepper took in the opened brandy keg, the shards of broken bottle, the
discarded lantern and the extinguished candle stub.

Clever
, he thought. He
glanced towards the other tubs at the back of the cellar. It was a good job
Hawkwood and Lasseur had concentrated their escape strategy on this immediate
area and that the flames had extinguished themselves before they'd had a chance
to spread to the rest of the kegs.

Pepper was already running for the stairs.

Hawkwood
and Lasseur had the perimeter wall in their sights when they heard the clamour.
Fortune had been on their side. Using the ruins as cover, they had made it as
far as the windowless shell where Hawkwood had encountered Morgan's dogs.

Cautiously,
Hawkwood raised his head and looked through one of the empty window frames
towards the main house, where several men were hurrying towards the sound of
the bell, which was becoming more insistent with each successive clang.

"I
think we can assume they've found Croker and Sol," Lasseur said drily.

"And
they'll be looking for us as soon as that bloody bell stops," Hawkwood
said. He turned, eyes probing the line of the wall, trying to recall where he'd
seen the nearest breach.

He
saw it and pointed. "There, close to the trees. There's a break in the
stonework. Morgan's plugged the gap, but we can use the tools to break
through."

They
ducked out from the ruin, using it as a shield, keeping low. The bell stopped
ringing when they were twenty paces out from the ruin. The first pistol shot
rang out ten paces further on. It did not come from behind them but from one of
two men who appeared out of the trees one hundred paces to Hawkwood's right.

When
he saw the men break cover and heard the cry, it dawned on Hawkwood that both
he and Lasseur had underestimated the discipline of Morgan's perimeter guards.
At some point, Morgan must have issued a directive telling his pickets to
remain at their stations in the event of an alarm, in case it signalled a
breach of the defences. While the rest of Morgan's crew had been answering the
summons behind them, the pickets had been moving into position. Their readiness
to engage and use weapons against them was proof that Morgan had alerted his
men to Hawkwood and Lasseur's indiscretions.

Hawkwood
swerved to one side, though he knew eagerness
had forced
the picket to fire too soon and from too great a range. There had been no risk
of the ball finding its target.

He
kept going.

There
was another cry, this time from the direction of the main buildings. The sound
of the pistol shot had travelled, alerting the rest of Morgan's crew that their
quarry had been sighted. There was no need for caution now. Hawkwood risked a
look over his shoulder. Beyond the ruin, he could see a dozen men were racing
towards them. Some with cudgels, others armed with pistols. Two looked as if
they were carrying muskets. Reassuringly, they were still some distance away.

He
turned back to see Lasseur steady himself, take aim with Sol's pistol and fire.
There was a sharp cry fifty paces away as the second picket staggered back clutching
his shoulder. Lasseur tossed the weapon aside.

Twenty
yards from the palisade, Hawkwood saw that he might have miscalculated. The
wooden stopgap was more substantial than he had anticipated.

Hawkwood
passed Lasseur the pistol he'd taken from Croker. "Make it count. It's all
we've got to hold them off."

The
advice sounded pitiful even to
his own
ears. But
Lasseur merely nodded as he received the weapon and turned to face the oncoming
threat.

Hawkwood
ran to the pile of tools, looking desperately for something to prise the stakes
of the palisade apart. There were some shovels, two picks, a selection of
mallets and a crowbar. He reached for the crowbar, knowing in his heart that
they had run themselves into a dead end.

We should have gone for the bloody horses,
he thought.

And
then he saw it, resting lengthways against the base of the wall, partially
concealed by the lime and sand bags.

A
ladder.

He
ran towards it even as he heard Lasseur's urgent warning: "They're
closing!"

Hawkwood
jammed the ladder up against the wall. As he did so, he heard a distant report
- a musket shot - and ducked instinctively, though he guessed the shooter was
still too far back. It was when they got to within a hundred yards that he
would start worrying, though he knew that time could only be seconds away.

Holding
the ladder in place, he yelled at Lasseur. "Come on, damn it!" And
saw that the first picket, who had stopped to snatch up his wounded companion's
firearm, was coming in fast.

Lasseur
turned and ran. The picket fired. An invisible finger plucked at the sleeve of
Lasseur's jacket. Hawkwood heard the privateer grunt as he threw himself
forward and began to climb. With a bellow of anger at having missed his target,
the picket drew his cudgel and came on.

Lasseur
turned on the ladder rung and levelled the pistol.

"Stand
still!"

Lasseur's
command rang out and stopped the picket in his tracks.

"I
will shoot you dead if you move," Lasseur said.

The
picket stared at him.

"Don't
make me kill you," Lasseur said.

Hawkwood
looked back to see that the rest of Morgan's crew were gaining considerable
ground. They had skirted the ruin and were now a little over a hundred yards
away. One of the men was kneeling. A musket cracked. The ball struck the rung
by Hawkwood's right hand and he felt a splinter slice into his wrist.

Lasseur
was astride the top of the wall. He was still pointing his gun at the picket,
who was less than thirty yards away, holding his ground in the face of
Lasseur's threat. He had seen Lasseur's first shot cut his companion down from
a greater distance and had no wish to suffer the same fate.

"No!"
Hawkwood yelled. "Don't wait! Go!"

But
Lasseur ignored him, stuck the pistol in his belt and stretched out his arm.