The Violent Peace (14 page)

“But now we can disassociate ourselves from such people. They were merely undisciplined civilians who saw no further than the single act which satisfied their spiteful intent.”

He sipped his tea and seemed to expect a comment from Steele. When the American failed to break his silence, Fuller continued.

“In a war, it is inevitable that some innocent people will suffer, others will die. But, in the end, all sacrifices will be justified.” He raised his teacup, as if it were a wine glass, in an informal toast. “I drink to Captain Carstairs; to the Confederacy for their great struggle over five long years to weaken and demoralize those who held power in Washington; and to the many thousands of men throughout the country who answered my call to partake in a victory that was denied them in the secessionist cause – but which will undoubtedly be fulfilled as part of the British Army of Liberation.”

Under normal circumstances, Steele might have given consideration to the sanity of the colonel, with his bellowing voice and the blazing eyes. He might have wondered if the man's words were the ravings of a megalomaniac or a declaration of intent with valid support. But everything Fuller said washed over and around Steele as the American fixed Carstairs with a level stare, heavily menacing in its complete lack of emotion.

Fuller seemed about to launch into a further discourse on his plans to win back the United States for the British crown. But a shout from the walkway above the gate halted him. Fuller looked through, and across the drill square, his excitement dying; to be replaced by a gentle smile of quiet pleasure.

“Ah, visitors,” he said, then used his rapid Urdu to give orders to the natives, who all broke away and ran, some into the castle
,
others across the compound to climb the stockade walls.

Steele glanced over his shoulder and saw the much depleted cavalry troop crossing the drill square. Only the lieutenant, sergeant, and three superficially wounded troopers were mounted. The rest - numbering six - marched in a column.

“Take the prisoner downstairs, Captain,” Fuller instructed. “We have more pressing business to attend to at the moment.”

When Steele turned around, he found himself looking down the barrel of a Colt revolver clutched in Carstairs' well-manicured right hand. The young Englishman was smiling in triumph.

“But don't harm him,” Fuller instructed. Carstairs' expression darkened, but then showed approval at the colonel's next comment. “The thuggees need some strenuous exercise, and we have not had a hunt for such a long time.”

Carstairs gestured with the revolver and Steele stepped forward, crossing the threshold into the dark coolness of the castle keep. As Steele went from sight, Carey led his unit in through the open gateway and halted his horse, his tired eyes growing wide with amazement as he saw the British officer calmly sipping tea, and eating sandwiches at the now unshaded table.

“What the hell…” the sergeant exclaimed softly.

“Welcome, lieutenant!” Fuller called warmly. “Please bring your men inside and join me for tiffin.”

Carey struggled to overcome his surprise. He cleared his throat and tried to inject a note of authority into his voice. “I must ask you to strike the Confederate colors, sir,” he called.

“At sunset,” Fuller acknowledged, then raised his voice and emitted a gutteral sound.

This was, in fact, an order for the thuggees. There was a strange rumbling sound which seemed to come from the sky. Several of the troopers glanced curiously up at the blue void, expecting to see suddenly formed thunder clouds.

“Christ!” the sergeant gasped, reaching for his rifle.

He did not get it clear of the boot. A ball from one of the four 12-pounders which had been rolled to the edge of the castle keep roof decapitated him and became buried in the chest of the trooper standing behind him.

Every other man in the troop fixed the roof with a terrified stare, frozen into an instant of immobility as they saw the black smoke whirling from the muzzle. Then the three other artillery pieces roared. One man's leg was shot off at the knee. Another was flung violently from his saddle, a gaping hole in his stomach where a ball had passed clean through him. A third stared down in disbelief at his dismembered arm as it fell to the ground. A fourth toppled sideways, then crawled around with tears streaming down his young face. He peered over the edge of a hole in the ground and reached inside it.

Colonel Fuller watched the carnage over the rim of his teacup and made no move to rise from the table as the survivors of the barrage shook free of their immobilizing horror and drew their guns.

The young trooper who had fallen succeeded in freeing something from beneath the ballshot at the bottom of the hole. It was the front half of his right boot. The crushed bones and pulped flesh of half his right foot was inside it. He smelled the blood and fainted.

Before the troopers could squeeze off a single shot, they were attacked for a second time; and again, death rained on them from above. This time it took the form of eight thuggees, dropping down from the walkway above the gate. Some landed lightly on their feet and lunged into the attack with flashing knives and whirling scarves. Others smashed down onto terrified troopers, plunging  knives into their chests or slinging scarves around pulsing, throats and jerking hard at the weighted ends.

They killed in complete silence, grinning broadly at each spurt of blood or sigh of stale air forced from dead lungs. Only three shots were fired by the troopers, all wild, the triggers of pistols and rifles squeezed by dying fingers. Those soldiers wounded by the artillery fire were shown no more mercy than the uninjured. So that, within thirty seconds, silence returned to the compound. The thuggees padded away on their bare feet, leaving behind them a ghastly pile of sprawled bodies; some with only a red weal on their throats; others dripping blood from terrible mutilations.

“Well done, men!” Fuller bellowed as the thuggees formed into ranks before the tea table and came to attention. “That is only a foretaste of what is required of you. I have no doubt that we will succeed in our purpose.”

At the foot of a dank staircase beneath the castle keep, Steele and Carstairs heard the colonel's excited voice end the silence which had succeeded the screams of the dying troopers. Carstairs waved the revolver towards an open doorway and Steele went through, into a rank smelling room with walls, floor und ceiling of solid rock. A thick wooden door with a small barred aperture in it was slammed closed. Two bolts were shot.

The Englishman had allowed him not the slightest opportunity to escape. In the near pitch blackness of the underground cell, he neither felt nor showed any despondency over this.

“Didn't take long, did it?” Carstairs said gleefully. “Those thuggees are quite something, aren't they?”

Steele fingered his throat, still showing the mark of the scarf which had threatened to throttle him. “They're just a pain in the neck,” he replied wryly. 

IT was eight o'clock the next morning when the stout door was flung open and three thuggees confronted Steele. One held a Henry rifle and the others balanced knives in their brown skinned hands, making it evident that they were prepared to hurl the blades, at the slightest provocation.

“You come with us,” the man with the rifle ordered.

Steele had slept the entire night and felt mentally rested. But the rock floor had been singularly lacking in comfort and his muscles were stiff. The walk up the stairway and across the compound loosened them a little. And the warm sunlight of morning extracted the chillness from his flesh.

The castle keep and area inside the stockade was in the grip of a strong silence. The bodies of the troopers had been removed from the gateway and there was only a scattering of dark stains as evidence of the massacre that had taken place there.

Steele ambled along in front of his escorts: and yet again, his strength of purpose and determination to take his revenge on the last of his father's murderers, negated any surprise he might have felt at the scene on the drill square.

Carstairs and Fuller were sitting astride handsome chestnut horses. Both men were attired in hunting pink, complete with hard black hats. The colonel held a brass hunting horn. Carstairs caught the rifle thrown to him by the thuggee and pointed it at Steele. The thuggees who had brought the prisoner up from the dungeon cell scuttled over to join their fellow countrymen standing at ease behind the mounted officers.

“Pink's definitely your color, Carstairs,” Steele said sardonically.  “It tones well with the yellow streak down your back.”

Carstairs scowled and changed the aim of the rifle, drawing a bead on Steele’s head.

“Now now, captain!” Fuller chided. “Shooting the quarry in cold blood is no sport for officers and gentlemen.”

“I'm the prey, uh?”
Steele asked.

“You should spell it with an
a
and do it,” Carstairs put in sourly.

Fuller's expression and tone became stern. “Captain Carstairs gave me a full report of the events in Washington, Steele. He killed your father in the execution of his duty to our cause. It was necessary in order to confuse the enemy. However, you have my admiration for the manner in which you have sought to avenge his death.” He nodded, agreeing with himself. Then he cleared his throat. “Whether the captain failed to realize you killed the men - rather than the army - because of cowardice or erroneous judgment is a matter of opinion. I choose to believe the latter.”

“For me, it makes no difference, I guess,” Steele replied,

“That is correct. You did what you considered to be your duty.  And, as such, you cannot be faulted. But neither can you be allowed to go unpunished for your interference with our cause.” He beamed suddenly, “I’m a man who believes in making the punishment fit the crime.” There was another abrupt switch in his mood, and he became sullen. “Unfortunately, the army authorities in India saw fit to take me to task for such a belief. But I intend to show you. You hunted down my men and killed them. Now you will be hunted down and killed.”

“Sounds like fun,” Steele muttered.

Fuller beamed again. “You will be given a reasonable head start. Most of the enjoyment is in the chase, eh what? The kill is merely the climax of all else. Now run, Steele - for your very life.”

Steele touched the brim of his hat. “I'm grateful to you, colonel,” he said, then turned and broke into a loping run, heading for one corner of the stockade wall.

“Excellent day for a hunt, captain,” Fuller commented, standing in the stirrups and glancing around at the barren terrain bathed in the gentle warmth of morning sunshine.

“Topping, sir,” Carstairs agreed, concentrating his attention upon the high ground above the rear of the fort.

He saw Steele once, fleetingly, darting, out from behind a boulder and then going from sight beyond the tessellated roof of the castle keep with the cannons still in position.

Steele did not concern himself with backward glances. The rising ground was steeper than it looked - and more rugged. The single night of long undisturbed sleep in the discomfort of the cell had achieved a little in restoring the energy which had drained from him throughout the chase. But the effort necessary to put space between himself and the men on the drill square soon negated its effect.

Not until he had crested the first major rise did he sink down and roll over to peer back the way he had come. The incongruous castle with its waving flags and the men ranged up in front of it looked like toys from such a height. But they were deadly playthings, and this was no game. Sunlight flashed on metal, and the shrill blast of the hunting horn drifted through the heat haze hanging over the barren terrain.

The brown skinned men in loincloths and scarves streamed off the drill square in an orderly run, then scattered as they advanced up the incline.

“Tally-ho!
”

Fuller's voice, travelling over such a distance, had a childlike quality about it. But he urged his horse forward into a canter with the skill of an expert. Carstairs was only yards behind him.

Steele checked the weapons the thuggees and British officers had not thought to look for. The knife rested snugly in the boot sheath; the derringer, with a single shot left, nestled in the pocket of his sheepskin coat. He fingered the ornate head of the tiepin. Then he rose into a crouch and raked the scattering of rocks on a level area before the ground took an upward incline again.

He settled on a cluster of boulders at the foot of the new slope and raced towards them, knowing he could not be seen by the men clambering up from below. He sank into the snug pocket of cover provided by the rocks and squatted down to wait.

Two thuggees crested the rise together, and split up, going to left and right. The hunting horn blasted, much closer than before. Three more thuggees leapt into view. Two went to the left. The other loped in the direction of Steele's hiding place. He slowed as he drew nearer, recognizing its possibility for cover. Then, abruptly, he made a running jump into the rocks, his knife ready for a lethal slash.

He was in mid-air when he saw Steele. He struggled to turn his body, to be in a position to attack when he landed. But Steele moved further to the side, his fingers snatching the tiepin free of the neckerchief. Six inches of pointed metal glinted, then streaked forward: The thuggee hit the ground and gave a gasp of horror. The pin pierced the side of his neck and penetrated to its full length. Blood from the punctured jugular vein gushed from his mouth as he fell.

“Bad way to go, but I guess you're stuck with it,” Steele muttered as he withdrew the pin.

The two mounted officers crested the rise only feet behind a group of panting thuggees. Fuller, his eyes blazing, gave another blast, on the horn. Carstairs changed his grip on the Henry repeater, holding it by the barrel. He crashed the stock across the back of one of the stragglers.

“Find him, you lazy buggers!” he shrieked.

The thuggees raced across the flat ground and up the new slope. The Englishmen galloped their horses on ahead. Three thuggees approached the rocks in which Steele was crouched. One went either side as the third clambered up and over.

The hunting horn wailed. Steele jerked out the derringer and sent a shot smashing into the heart of the man on the rocks. Only the men close to him heard the shot against the cry of the horn. Both turned towards Steele, one with a knife, the second whirling his scarf.

Steele's hand streaked to his boot. His own knife came free. He hurled it, underhand, and the thuggee's weapon spun away as he grasped at the handle of Steele's knife, which seemed to be growing from his belly. Steele leapt clear of the man's falling body, pivoting as he did so and swinging a clenched fist. The third thuggee was lunging at him, whirling the weighted scarf above his head. He saw the fist rocketing towards him and tried to parry the blow. But Steele pulled the punch, and raked his arm to right and left. The world went black for the thuggee as the point of the tiepin, protruding between Steele's clenched fingers, slashed across both eyes, blinding him. He fell to his knees and wailed, his hands becoming covered with blood as he rubbed at his sliced eyes.

There was no blast of the hunting horn to conceal this sound. Steele heard a shout and whirled to look up the slope. He saw Carstairs in the process of wheeling his mount and knew the Englishman had seen him.

He leapt clear of the rocks and raced across the flat area towards the top of the lower slope. He slid over the edge and pressed himself flat, cursing. His knife was still buried in the stomach of one of the thuggees. He had dropped the tiepin on the run and the derringer was empty. He heard the thunder of galloping hooves and rolled over on to his back under the lip of the hill top. His eyes swiveled upwards to their fullest extent. He saw the head of the horse, then the forelegs. Carstairs boots in the stirrups came into view. Steele launched himself upright, arms reaching, hands clawed. In that split second, Carstairs saw him: excitement of anticipation becoming pleasure of the act. He aimed the rifle to fire.

Steele caught the barrel in a two handed grip and jerked. The horse was committed to its leap over the edge of the rise. Neither man was prepared to release his grip on the rifle: until Carstairs was snatched bodily from the saddle. The Englishman screamed and flailed his arms and legs, seeking a way to break his fall.

His hands hit the rocky ground first. The impact snapped his arms at the wrists and elbows and gleaming white bone burst through flesh in great spurts of scarlet blood. His body smashed down. The scream became a groan and he rolled his head over to stare in horror at Steele.

“All the way, you've been riding for a fall,” Steele said, turning the rifle. He shot Carstairs in the side of the head from a range of only inches. The Englishman's brains sizzled in a dozen steaming blobs on the hot rocks.

“Did you get him, captain?” Fuller's voice held a note of disappointment. It warned Steele not to waste time in regret that Carstairs had died so quickly. He turned and flung himself to the ground, then bellied up the slope until he could see across the flat area. Fuller was walking his horse across the small plain, accompanied by eight thuggees, flanking him, four on each side.

Steele waited until they were in the centre of the open ground, then went up on to one knee. Fuller halted his horse, and the entire side of his face twitched in hot fury. The thuggees looked at their commander for orders. Steele squeezed the trigger and pumped the action, squeezed the trigger and pumped the action, Eight times. Each shot was carefully placed, into the heart of an unmoving thuggee.

When the last man pitched to the ground, Fuller allowed the hunting horn to fall and raised his hands.

“It is not in my nature to order a retreat,” he said. “And they would not like to have died whilst running away.”

Steele pumped the repeater, slotting a bullet into the breech. “One man who lived by the sword is going to perish by something else,” he said softly.

Fuller brought his tic under control. “I should like it to be with dignity,” he replied.