Grantville Gazette, Volume 69

by Bjorn Hasseler

  “Richard, it hurts,” Kirsten screamed when the first contraction hit.

  “The up-timers say you must control your breathing, little one. Screaming only frightens you more,” the midwife told her. “Now when the contraction stops, begin breathing deeply. Slow deep breaths. As the next hits, breathe in rapid panting breaths. Like a dog on a hot day. Most of all, find something to concentrate on. Talk to your man, watch his face. Focus everything outside your body on him.”

  She looked up at Hartmann. “I am sorry, Richard.”

  “Sorry for what?”

  “For putting you through this. Your wife died this way, and—”

  “You will not think of dying,” he snapped. “You will live, the child will live. I will have it no other way.”

  “Still—” She flinched.

  “Breathe! Rapid panting, do it!” he ordered.

  She began to pant, eyes locked on his face.

  The tent flap flew back, and Poirot burst in. “Mon amour, mon cœur! Je suis là pour toi!” He rushed past the midwife, taking the other hand, his whispered endearments continuing.

  Hartmann felt her hand loosen, and saw the man wince as the clamp locked on him instead. “Kirsten, tell him what the midwife said about the breathing.” She relaxed from the second contraction and repeated the instructions. Once she had, her face focused on the Frenchman rather than him.

  Hartmann stepped back, leaving the tent. Then he found himself praying. “We have not spoken much; I do not even know if you hear me anymore. But please, if you have cursed me, do not kill this girl!” He paused in his walk back toward the MP tent when he heard a disturbance. Half a dozen prisoners were pushing and shoving each other.

  Great; he was in the mood to hurt someone. Hartmann stalked toward the fight as the first punch was thrown. He paused, handing his wheel-lock and knives to the guard just standing there and stepped inside the circle of men watching.

  He caught the man who had been knocked down, lifted him to his feet, and slammed his head into the man's face, breaking his nose and dropping him back to the ground. He back-kicked another man in the crotch, and the man who had been throwing a punch at this victim had his fist skate over the wounded man's head to hit Hartmann in the mouth.

  He stood stunned as Hartmann smiled. Then Hartmann caught his arm, pulling the man into him and slamming his other hand up into his armpit hard enough to dislocate it. Then he hit him with the edge of his fist, dislocating his jaw.

  The other three backed away, stunned. Hartmann looked at each face. “Becker!" When the man pushed his way in, Hartmann motioned. "Translate!" He stood, ready to fight, catching the eyes of not only the other combatants but the crowd as well. "The next time I see this happening, I will deal with it."

  One of the men mumbled, and Hartmann looked to Becker. “He said there are still three of them and only one of you.”

  Hartmann smiled, looking more like a wolf baring his fangs at the man who dropped his fists and backed again. “Three to one? Looks like a fair fight to me. Still interested?”

  One of the French spectators caught the man who had spoken. “C'est le sergent fou qui a brisé le Tercio. Si un millier d'hommes ne pouvaient arrêter son charge, quelle chance avez-vous trois?”

  Another commented, “C'est un carcajou en forme humaine!”

  “Becker?”

  The younger man was grinning. “They are reminding these three of what you did on the field, Sergeant. Said 'if a thousand men couldn't stop his charge, what chance do just you three have?' ” He spoke rapidly, and the three men raised their hands as if to say there would be no more problems.

  "Good." Hartmann pointed at the men groaning on the ground. "Take these to the hospital. Becker, have your squad guard them until they have been treated. And I know the rest of you have things to do!" He stormed off.

  “What was that last?” Luftmann asked.

  “He said the sergeant is a wolverine in human form.”

  Luftmann watched the sergeant out of sight. “An animal who does not care what he fights because he intends to win.” He grinned. “We have to tell the men.”

  ****

  Hartmann glanced at the cart parked in front of the tent beside the MP headquarters, and at the men unpacking it. A couple of pale men were sitting to the side of the tent, with the smell of vomit. He dismissed them from his mind; not his problem. The guard opened the flap for him. “I was told to send you in, Sergeant.”

  “—I became curious when I saw the chest looked like it had been unearthed recently.” Frakes was reporting to Hess, who sat at his desk, a large whiskey in his hand.

  "Ah, Sergeant. We have been waiting for you," Hess drained the glass as if it were water and poured another glass, motioning toward Frakes without standing. "Show him."

  The wachtmeister opened the filthy chest, gently lifting out a jar. Hartmann took it. For a long moment, he wasn't sure what he was seeing. Then he realized it was a woman's face floating in liquid. By shifting it, he saw it was just the skin of the face and hair peeled from her skull. A label had been pasted then varnished on it; number six. Reverently he set it down and looked again. There were a dozen of the jars. At the front, a polished wooden box had been used to brace them, and Frakes opened it. There were several knives and long thin needles.

  Hess pointed at the box. “I asked one of the up-timer medics if he knew what those are. He told me the knives are what are used at autopsies, and the needles are what are called acupuncture needles used in Eastern medicine.” Then he looked to Frakes. “You preserved the evidence very well, wachtmeister.”

  “Thank you, Sir.” Frakes began removing the jars from the chest, revealing what looked like a flower press atop some folders. One was a journal, and the young man opened it. “The monster recorded their names and everything he did to them. But this journal refers to another earlier journal, probably still in the chest. He would let the faces sit in the alcohol for a year, then tanned them.” He flipped through the pages. “There are other names, possibly accomplices…my God.” He went back to the jars, lifting one that had fluid but nothing else marked number 12. Then he held the book out to Hartmann. The sergeant looked at the page. Nombre de douze KIRSTEN JANSEN.

  “Well, you can let the girl know she is not to be charged. This man of yours, I could use him in my unit.”

  “How would that be for you, Frakes?” Hartmann asked.

  "I did this kind of work before I joined the Army, Sergeant. This does not bother me." He waved at the jars as he opened a folder with tanned human faces. "I feel right about catching such monsters. Killing people who are only my enemy frightened me more."

  “Have him transferred.”

  Frakes stood, putting out his hand. "Thank you, Sergeant."

  ****

  Hartmann returned to the hospital tent. Kirsten looked bedraggled as she again stopped panting to take deep breaths. "Richard, I wish you to act as the father this one time."

  He was confused. “Father?”

  “The breath of life.” She stiffened, back to the panting breathing. As the midwife told her to push, the girl looked at him. “Please.”

  The midwife reached up then her free hand came up with a knife. One deft movement, then she held up the baby girl. “Sergeant?”

  Hartmann reached out. The child was so small. Then he lifted the baby to his face. “From those who have come before you, I pass on the breath of life.” Then he breathed gently into the small mouth. The baby coughed, then began to cry.

  “Frau Jansen, you have a daughter.” Frau Stein told her.

  Hartmann passed the baby to Kirsten, who looked at her with wonder. She looked at Poirot, then at Hartmann. “May I use your wife's name, Richard?”

  “She would be honored.”

  Kirsten touched the baby's face.“You who have been so close to my heart for so long. Welcome to the world, Marta.”

  ****

  He paced the line of sentries as he always did. After a time, Hartmann had merely sto
pped correcting all of those who congratulated him on the birth of his daughter. The child was not his; the real father had gotten what he deserved in this world and was surely getting it in the next. Richard paused, pulling out the pouch of tobacco, but it was empty. He had spent his lunch dealing with the MP officer, then his dinner with the girl as the baby had been born, so he had forgotten to get the fresh pouch from his bag. He started to turn, but something caught his eye.

  There was someone standing inside the prisoner's area, watching him. In the fading light, he recognized the cavalryman he had slapped. "Is it now the time?" he asked.

  "For us to talk, yes." Francesco stepped forward. "After this morning, I wanted to face and kill you. But these last hours, I have learned much about you. You struck me not as an insult to me, but because I have injured someone you protect. Your men and the women of your camp followers speak of you as if you were their father, and you treated me as if I were a man hurting your child. You are a brave man who will let no slight pass, and I, I am ashamed that I am nothing like you. I am in the wrong in this. And I cannot call myself a man if I cannot admit that to the one I insulted."

  He bowed deeply. “I ask that you accept my apology. How might I make this right?”

  Richard looked at the man, only a few years younger than himself, then replied gently. “You did not have to apologize to me. But Bridget and Maggie deserve one.” He took out the pouch again, then remembered that he had just checked it.

  “Permisso.” Francesco held out a small pouch. “Tobacco from the Virginia colony. And if you will, I have a bottle of grappa to drink in honor of the child.”

  Hartmann filled his pipe silently. "When you apologize, you do not hold back." He motioned and paced down to the closest sentry. He passed the wheel-lock on his hip to the man. "Watch this for me, Kraus."

  ****

  Bridget looked up from where she was serving the morning porridge. Someone was standing back from the line, not pushing as the others were. Oh, him. “An' what would ye be wanting, you cur?” She snapped, ladling out the next serving and handing it to the prisoner in front of her.

  “To speak to your mother and yourself when you have the time.”

  “Ma! He's back again! An' wishes to talk this time!”

  Maggie looked up, then charged toward the serving line like a destrier. “Off with ye!” She waved as if shooing away a dog. “We'll have none of ye here!”

  The Italian didn't move. "Please, Signora, I came to speak to you and your daughter. In private if we may."

  She huffed, then turned. “Gerta! Come over and take Bridget's place!” She turned back, pointing a minatory finger. “An' this time I have me filleting knife, so be warned.”

  She led him back a few feet from the serving line. Then she turned, crossing her arms. “Speak an' be damned.”

  "When I spoke to your sergeant, I gave him such words, but he said I must give them to you. First, I speak to you, Bridget. My words to you were unkind, and throwing the stew in your face was uncalled for. I have no excuse and ask that you forgive my actions." He motioned to her blistered face. “I do hope you will not be scarred by this. If you are, I pledge that I will pay recompense freely. Such an attractive young woman should not bear scars from the actions of a fool such as myself.

  “Signora Maggie, pushing you to the ground was an insult you should not have borne. I ask you also to forgive me. If you cannot, I will accept this.”

  Maggie watched him for a long moment. “The words are sweet, and I do accept. I wish to withdraw my comment. Ye' dinna look like a catamite to me, but I was angry. I will forgive, but never forget. Merely do as a good man might from this point on.”

  Bridget took the man by his arm. “Come, you have not yet eaten, this I know.” She went to the line, then down it, returning to him with a bowl of porridge, savories already added, and a slab of meat atop a slice of bread. “Now be off with you! I have work to do!”

  He smiled, bowing, then left. Bridget watched him out of sight, then flinched when a horny thumb poked her in the ribs. Her mother was standing there, grinning. “Back to work. He will be back for luncheon an' dinner!”

  Bridget smiled at her mother, but her eyes grew dreamy. He had said she was pretty!

  ****

  Jean-Claude Crozier shook his head as he awoke. He had far too much to drink the night before. Finally, Roquelaire was dead. The man had been killed three days before by one of the putains de camp allemand. A poetic death considering what he would do to her if they had only known.

  The night before he was killed, the Frenchman had come and told him of the Book. That when Crozier had helped him with the one putains de camp during the siege, he had recorded it all. Every cut, every burn.

  He regretted it now, more because the Frenchman had added that one day he would need something; money, sanctuary, perhaps a ship to another port? And when Crozier had delivered, the pages would be given to him, with proof there were no more to be burned. What would his brother a minor noble of Loire say? That his younger brother had become aroused at the pain inflicted on some village slut? But nothing had come of the death. Perhaps they had not found the book.

  When he had been captured at Nutschel, he had paid for a courier to have his ransom request delivered. As soon as it arrived, he would fly from here, never take service again to anyone where the lunatics of the USE would be fought!

  There was a noise outside his tent, then one of the enemy soldiers pulled the flap open. “Jean-Claude Crozier? Come with me please.”

  "One moment, please." His things had been returned, so he opened the trunk getting out a doublet. "What is this about."

  “Brigette Svendsen.” The man replied.

  “Who?”

  Now the bland face became disgusted. "Honestly, you helped torture an innocent woman to death and did not even bother to find out her name? God in Heaven. Get your ass out here or officer or no, I will have you bound and dragged!"

  He would have to work fast, hope they did not send too many to take him into custody. He walked forward, and as he came even with the man, drew the soldier's bayonet, and thrust it up into the man's heart. He drew the man's sword as he fell.

  ****

  Hartman and his company had been assigned to help one of the up-timers, Allan Lydick. The man was an engineer who had been sent to design the new slips for the Navy the Swedes envisioned. But he had a degree in what they called civil engineering, and as the month waned, he had been sent to see what needed to be done to improve the road to where the prisoners were being kept.

  Lydick had been unworried about the prisoners less than a hundred yards away. He had taken his rifle from a scabbard on the saddle, and was letting Hartmann look at it as the men were marking trees to cut down and widen the road.

  "It's an old Remington rolling block my grandfather gave me. They were made right after our Civil War, round eighteen sixty-seven, so it takes black powder cartridges pretty well." There was a shot in the camp, and Hartmann's head snapped up.

  ****

  There had been two more guards, but they must have assumed a gentleman would merely let himself be arrested. Crozier slashed, and the first went down with his throat sliced open. He thrust the second through the heart. He caught up the rifle the first man dropped and picked the closest mounted sentry as his target. The ball punched the man from his horse, and Crozier ran to the horse, mounting as shouting began.

  ****

  Hartmann heard the shouting. Now more shooting came from the camp, and one man on a horse rode frantically toward the trees over three hundred yards away. His mind raced. If the rider had broken south, he would have had Hartmann's men to deal with, and even an unloaded rifle could trip a horse. So he had broken instead to the north. Further to run—the nearest city was Keil, and the horse would founder in an hour or so.

  But his men had their rifles stacked. He would be out of sight before anyone could load. Hartmann reopened the action. "Cartridge, please, Herr Lydick?"

&
nbsp; “What?” The man looked at Hartmann's open hand for a moment, then stripped a round off his belt. Hartmann looked down, loaded the rifle, then closed the breech.

  ****

  He was free! If he made the trees. They would need the cavalry to follow, and Crozier was a past master of scouting, so he knew where and how to hide. There was no way they could—

  ****

  Hartmann aimed. The sights were better than those of the SRGs, but not as good as the twenty-twos he had used to teach his men. He tracked the rider smoothly. The shot came as a surprise, as it should.

  For a second, Lydick thought he had missed. But there was suddenly a cloud of red from the rider, and he grabbed his lower back. Then he began to slide to the right, the free hand now pinwheeling as he tried to regain his balance. That ended when his face smacked into one of the first trees, and he was plucked from the saddle to sprawl as the horse raced on.

  Hartmann opened the breech, bending to pick up the expended brass. “Hamner!”

  “Sergeant?” The man ran over to him.

  "Take some men. If he is alive, take him to the hospital. If he is not, bring back the body."

  “Yes, Sergeant.” Hamner looked at the rifle. “That was an amazing shot!” Then he ran shouting for men to come with him.

  Hartmann handed it back. “A very accurate weapon.”

  Lydick looked at it. He had a good eye and judged the range to be over three hundred yards. "Your man was right, Sergeant. An outstanding shot."

  “Do not tell my men, but I was aiming at the horse.” Hartmann didn't understand when Lydick first laughed, then began humming the theme from The Magnificent Seven.

  As Hartmann assigned men to cut down the trees, Lydick considered. He paced off the distance, and then walked back, looking at the self-deprecating sergeant. Four hundred ten yards.

  ****

  June, 1634

  Kirsten looked up from where Marta was nursing, her smile brightening her face. “Richard!”

  She started to stand, but he gently pushed her back down. “She has had no problems yet?”