Grantville Gazette, Volume 65

by Bjorn Hasseler

  Aloyse started toward the door, but Frau Kaufmann stopped her. "He will never heal if we keep reminding him of his loss."

  Hartmann looked up as the door opened, Aloyse was carrying a tray, with a teapot and two cups. "Here. Just what you need, Sergeant." He looked at her in quiet amusement as she poured and handed him a cup. "My one vice, mint tea. I asked, and Frau Kaufmann thought it would go well with the pie. I must see about that typewriter." She bustled back out.

  He breathed in the mint vapor, then sipped it. Instead of cutting into the pie, he filled the new pipe, puffing it to light.

  11:00 PM

  Becker looked up as Frau Kaufmann entered the barracks. "Did you tell him? Is he coming?"

  She shook her head. "He has the guards watching for your attempts." Everyone groaned.

  Becker began pacing rapidly. "What about Aloyse?" he asked.

  "Who?"

  "The colonel's daughter! I spoke to her right before she headed for headquarters, to try to keep the sergeant occupied for a few hours until we were ready."

  "If she is who I think, she has kept him occupied too well. They are deep into some report the girl is writing for her father."

  Becker grabbed his own hair and tried to pull it out. "What can I do now!"

  11:20 PM

  "He is not coming," Becker commented glumly.

  "Of course not, you silly bitch," Sergeant Strombeck replied. Becker spun. They had done so much! The camp followers had made a cake and snacks, Becker and Hamner had bought in beer and cider, and the bastard was ignoring them?

  "You do not get it." Strombeck sighed. "All he has to do is not come back to the area until after his watch. If he is not here before midnight, your party fails."

  Becker growled, "I will not give up!"

  Strombeck grinned. "Did you know if a group shouts 'rhubarb' without timing it so it is merely a shout, it sounds like an angry crowd?"

  Becker looked at him, then pointed at some of his men. "Shout ‘rhubarb!' " As the men did so, Becker waited, and shouted the same after about half of the word. It did sound like an argument! "So we need you as part of it."

  "What do you think he will do if there is a riot here, and I went in without ending it?" Strombeck asked.

  11:30 PM

  Hartmann closed the cover on his watch. There was no more time for any surprise party. He sighed in satisfaction. Just another half hour—

  "Sergeant of the Guard!" He leaped up and was running at the call. A guard stood outside the door to the building, looking around as if he expected an attack any moment. "Sergeant! We have a report of a riot in the camp!"

  "Get the MPs here. Now!" Half a dozen men with MP brassards came up at the double time, another feldwebel leading them. "You men, with me!" Hartmann charged into the camp.

  It was only about four hundred yards to the regimental street. As they jogged past, other men who were still up looked curious. They were within fifty yards when he could hear shouting. The barracks where his new trainees were assigned was fully lit, and men were shouting inside. A number of people, some from his own company, were standing about.

  "Where is Sergeant Strombeck?" he demanded.

  "He went in, and if anything the shouting grew louder, Sergeant."

  Hartmann snarled, then charged forward, the MPs following. He yanked the door open. "What the hell do you think you are doing!"

  The men inside fell silent. Hartmann had enough time to see that it wasn't the recruit company; it was his own who had filled the room along with a dozen camp followers. Then in one voice from before and behind they shouted, "Happy Birthday, Sergeant!"

  He stared around, shocked as his men came to him in a crowd. Hands slapped him on the back as women hugged him. A barrel of beer had been placed where the first bunk should have been, and Becker handed him a foaming mug. "Drink with us, please!"

  "I told you not to do anything like this," Hartmann growled.

  "Is it not good I had arranged it all before you gave me that order? And moved it to these barracks rather than our own?" Becker asked. "Now come, Sergeant Hartmann, drink with us to celebrate the day!"

  "You damn fools, I am still on duty!"

  "Sergeant Hartmann?" He turned. A sergeant he had seen but not met was at the door. "Sergeant Franz, your relief. Is there anything I should know?"

  "My entire company is made up of sneaky bastards!"

  "A given, Sergeant," the young man said with a grin. "Sergeant, I relieve you!"

  Hartmann wanted to scream, to yell, to break furniture and heads. Instead, he began to laugh helplessly. He completed the ritual, then took the beer.

  12:00 Midnight

  "We hoped you would like it," Hamner said. Hartmann looked at the beautiful rifle he had held the day before and at the pistol that had come with it. There was a box, and he opened it, taking out the slim case of a full metal cartridge. "Why that sneaky bastard."

  "He lied, Sergeant," Becker said, sipping his beer. "But in a good cause."

  "I hate you all," Hartmann snarled, then lifted the rifle. "But thank you all for this."

  The men came by, slapping his shoulder and shaking his hand. Hartmann picked up his beer, sipping it.

  "Sergeant!" He looked up as Aloyse walked across the room. There were wolf whistles, and someone shouted, "Kiss her!"

  "Kiss the colonel's daughter? For shame, men." Hartmann offered a tankard, and she sipped it delicately. "How is the report going?"

  "That young feldwebel in the guardroom helped me by typing it up. He said it is easy to learn, and I decided to add the skill as something a woman may learn to become a soldier in the rear echelon. My father came by as it was being finished, and he said it was well-written, and he will deliver it to General Knyphausen tomorrow as a suggestion."

  "So one day you might be in uniform." Hartmann smiled. "And Sergeant Dieffenbacher is out of a job?"

  "I don't think so." She watched, waiting until he began to drink. "After this evening, I think it is your job I am after."

  His grinned then reached into his tunic, handing her his well-thumbed copy of Kipling's collected works.

  " 'If you can keep your head when all about you

  Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;

  If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

  But make allowance for their doubting too.' "

  He tilted his tankard against hers. "You will need this, then."

  Customs

  By Jack Carroll and Terry Howard

  St. Pietersberg, Netherlands

  Midsummer's Eve, 1636

  The road into Maastricht wound along between the river and the foot of the steep-sided hill. Joris de Groon was perfectly content to trail along at the end of the party—the half-dozen men weren't raising enough dust to matter, and it mercifully left a little distance between him and Capitán de Douane Dirk van der Valk. He nudged Aart Boegens and spoke out the side of his mouth. "Look at the way that fat blowhard struts along. I think that fancy title 'Captain of Customs' the Spanish gave him has gone to his head. Now he's got his big plumed hat to wave around and that silver-hilted sword to play with."

  Aart winked back at him. "Maybe so, but he does well enough at finding taxes and contraband and anything else that looks a little out of order. And when the state makes money, he makes money, and when he makes money, we make money."

  "Please. You're spouting the obvious, just like he loves to do all the time. Do you suppose he'll tell us lowly ignoramuses in another minute that the sun has gone down behind the hill? Or just go off on another one of his long-winded rants against the Remonstrants and anyone else who doesn't bend the knee to Rome?"

  "He might, he might. Huh. What's he stopping for, do you suppose?" The baas was off to the side of the road, half-stooped over, moving crabwise toward one of the openings in the side of the hill, a natural cave, not one of the stonecutters' tunnels.

  "Ha! See that?" Van der Valk was pointing his rigid finger down at the dirt in front of the c
ave entrance.

  One of the men up front moved in. "What, Captain? I don't see anything."

  "Exactly, Burchgert. Light your lantern and hand it to me. All of you, attend. Look here." In another moment the whole party was gathered around the area he encircled with his arms. He swung the lantern around over the spot. "See, swept smooth. No footprints. There should be footprints, every child within a day's walk must know of this place. Someone wants to hide that they were here!"

  "The French smugglers?"

  Joris let off a quiet snort, too low to be heard more than arm's length away. How could anyone know whether they're French or not? But it didn't matter. If there were smugglers, that was good enough, and it was plain enough by what had been showing up in the town markets that there were smugglers.

  "Who else could it be? This must be where they hide the contraband and stolen goods, until they can dispose of them. Dirty outlanders! They steal work from our guilds, from all of us. Now secure your gear so it doesn't clink, and follow me." He rose to his feet and gave his sword an experimental tug, making sure it was free in its scabbard, then primed his pistol. Well, that was sensible enough. Every now and then in a band of smugglers you met a few who had reason not to be taken alive. Some of them weren't much different from pirates.

  Van der Valk led off. The roomy chamber they entered was mostly as it had been since the beginning of the world, except for the floor, worn smooth by feet and wheels passing through since before the Romans came. Much of the rock overhead looked like it had melted and run like wax. In a few places some long-forgotten quarryman had split a block away.

  It was near the back of the cave that a squared tunnel, high enough to stand up in, led away into the silent darkness. It was just about wide enough to haul out a block of building stone on a handcart. There was a scraped place in front of it that might have been recent. The captain looked at it with a rumble of satisfaction, and turned to face the men. "We will have to leave the pole arms here."

  Joris looked at the narrow passage and hid a grunt. Tell me something I don't know. Better leave your hat, too.

  Tedium descended. Chalk an arrow on the wall at each turning, to show which way they'd come. Write a number over it, for how far. Some of the chambers were huge, where the quarrymen had found big pockets of good building stone. Some of the passages were barely wide enough to get through, snatching with claws of fractured stone at van der Valk's fine wool coat, not to mention his lace cuffs. Reach a dead end, backtrack to the last unsearched branch, begin again. Joris put more attention into making sure he didn't get separated from the party, than anything else.

  ****

  By midnight Dirk van der Valk was getting frustrated and impatient. There had to be something here in this ancient labyrinth, he was sure of it, but the lamp oil was starting to be a concern. He was on the point of ordering a return to the outside through one of the nearer entrance tunnels they'd explored, when there was a faint sound. He threw out one hand, fingers spread, palm down. Silence. He put his hand to his ear. A rhythmic tapping? Maybe dripping water, but… He led off again, stepping as softly as he could, pausing often to listen. It got louder as they got closer, and presently he could hear a soft tootling. They're having a celebration? Made some big profit? He resisted the urge to rush ahead. A few steps further on . . .

  He spun around and held up his hand, then beckoned the men to come close, so they could hear him whisper. "Quiet, there's a light ahead. Cover the lanterns." From here, a soft chanting from several voices was audible. He strained to hear. After a minute or so, he'd heard enough to be sure—it wasn't Dutch. Certainly not Latin. Nothing he could recognize. Slowly, silently, he drew his sword. His men readied cutlery and cudgels, according to what they had. He crouched as low as he could without smudging his clothing on the tunnel floor, and peered around the turning. There was someone on guard, but watching whatever was happening among his friends, not looking outward. Foolish. He motioned Aart forward, and pointed to the sand-filled stocking hanging at the man's belt. Aart nodded, sucked in his breath and squeezed past, and cat-footed ahead. Presently he dragged an unconscious man back to the customs party. Dirk stepped over the fellow in the narrow passage and waited until the rest had followed.

  He edged around the last turning and prepared to charge—from here on, surprise would depend on speed, not silence. He stepped full into the candle-lit chamber, and froze for an instant in utter astonishment.

  The place was as big as a tavern's main room, and twice as high. There was some sort of a crude painting on the far wall. But the people—

  A man wearing nothing but a magnificently horned stag-headdress completely enclosing his own head, rampant in his nakedness, and a sinuously weaving woman bare except for a matching doe's-head, were dancing clockwise to the beat of the music, facing each other across a knee-high stone platform spread with fragrant pine boughs and deerskin robes. Flowers showed around the edges. Their intention couldn't have been more obvious. Five large green candles burned at equally spaced points on a circle drawn around them. Along the walls a dozen or so white-robed figures with wreaths of oak leaves on their heads stood in pairs, one playing a wooden whistle, one tapping his fingers on a small hand-held drum, and the rest holding torches aloft.

  Dirk involuntarily focused for an instant on the strawberry birthmark between the woman's breasts, a birthmark that stirred a memory—and recovered his voice enough to bellow one word—"Abomination!"

  The chamber erupted in shouts and scurrying. In an instant it became clear that the place was anything but a dead end; the celebrants disappeared in two different directions. The turn in the narrow passageway behind Dirk delayed his men just a few moments too long. It didn't help that Dirk wasted a couple of heartbeats frozen where he stood, squarely in front of the passage. By the time the chase was well under way, the slam of a heavy door echoed through the tunnels, and a bolt thunked into place somewhere.

  The priest and priestess, if that's what they were, weren't so lucky. The time they needed to get the clumsy headdresses off so they could bolt was time they didn't have. Dirk shouted, "You two damned witches stand fast! Don't move, or I'll shoot."

  The "stag" had both hands on his headdress, pushing at it and trying to get it off, and looking like he was sizing up his chances. The woman snatched hers off. She just glared at Dirk with an expression of distaste.

  "Lucia?" van der Valk blurted. She was one of the serving girls at an inn in town. "What are you doing here? How could you do this?"

  She snorted. "They pay a whole lot better than you do, Customs Captain van der Valk. And he doesn't slap me around, either. Besides, he knows what a man is supposed to do and he keeps doing it until I'm howling with joy."

  Dirk felt his face turn to flame. He stepped forward and slapped her. "You will burn in hell for this disgraceful travesty, you filthy hoer!"

  Lucia shrugged and wiped the blood off the corner of her mouth. "So, I am a whore? Why not, when it pays? And you know all about that, don't you?"

  Captain van der Valk struck her back-handed and knocked her down. The stag-headed man started to move forward with a wordless shout. Van der Valk stuck the pistol against the snout of the headdress. "One more move and I'll blow your perverted head off. Now get that obscene thing off."

  The man pushed straight up a couple of times, and finally it came free. Jan Marten van der Meulen, a supposedly respectable member of the lens grinder's guild, stood looking Dirk in the eye. "Do you mind if we get dressed?"

  Dirk threw the man his best glare. "No, I certainly don't mind you two idolators getting properly dressed. And then, after we search this place for contraband, you are coming with us. Aart, go back and secure that other one."

  The Maastricht prosecutor's chamber

  A few days later

  The room wan't particularly comfortable. It was cramped and cluttered, if anything, and the whitewash showed the soot of many candles. It had south-facing windows, which was good and bad; it was well-lighte
d, but hot.

  Van der Valk's meaty hand smacked the chair arm. "In the name of Heaven, Aanklager van Loo, what is responsible for this damnable delay? What possible doubt can there be that these heksen we caught in the caverns should be burned and their goods forfeited? They were in the middle of a Black Mass!" He gave no thought at all to his daughter-in-law's remonstrance only the previous day that a man of his age and girth ought to have more sense than to indulge in fits of rage.

  Prosecutor van Loo sniffed. "Witches conducting a Black Mass, you imagine? Do you even know what is done in a Black Mass, good captain?"

  "Ah, not precisely, no."

  "Well, I do, and those two don't. If the third one your man sapped hadn't awakened and scurried away during the confusion, I doubt he would have known, either. I have had occasion to study the literature on the subject. The candles weren't even the right color. And meanwhile, your public rantings have so inflamed everyone who has even heard of the affair that I can scarcely manage to conduct a proper investigation. My guards have more work keeping the town rowdies out than the prisoners in."

  "Investigation? Why not just put them to the question? Nothing could be simpler!"

  The prosecutor made a brushing-away gesture. "Simple, but not particularly useful. Have you read Spee's Cautio Criminalis? No, I see by your face that you have not. The rack and thumbscrew are a simple way to get them to denounce whatever enemies they might have, or just shout names at random to get the pain to stop. And I think you might now be counted among their enemies, eh?" He cocked his head to one side, with a tight smile.

  Dirk's stomach flip-flopped for the merest instant. Was that was a threat? No, it could be no more than a jest. He shifted in his chair. "Well, what are you doing, then?"

  "I've looked closely at what was around that stone altar, and in the nearby parts of the cavern. That wall painting could conceivably be a depiction of Pan, if you squint the right way. My men and I have minutely examined their quarters and van der Meulen's shop. The town watch is mostly local men; they've heard things about Gronsveld customs, where van der Meulen comes from. They are following up and keeping an ear on tavern chatter. There is great doubt in some circles that witchcraft even exists, but I would very much like to know the precise nature of this secretive folk whatever-it-was that you stumbled upon."