Things had gone deadly quiet as soon as Thomas had opened his mouth. The other Irish fellow in the rectory-medium-sized, built square and deep in the chest, but light in the hips and legs-was looking at Thomas as if he had just devoured a newborn infant. “Feckin’ sassenach. Of course. Here with some up-time mercenaries to assassinate Father Luke, using the chaos of the moment to sneak in and kill ’im.”
For a moment, the whole Wrecking Crew was speechless. “What?” Sherrilyn finally squawked, “What the hell is he talking about?”
But the Irishman wasn’t finished. “Well, yeh bastards, you’ve put your foot in it now. Drop your weapons or I’ll call the rest of the Spanish on you so fast that-”
Harry didn’t shout often, but when he did, it was a sharp, cutting baritone: “Shut up! Those gunshots have called the Spanish better than you could have. Now, the way I figure it, we’ve got maybe ten seconds. So hear this: I don’t know what the hell a sassenach is, but I’m here on orders from the USE. And I’m not here to kill the priest. Hell, I don’t even know who he is. But you want him out? Fine by me. Because right now, if we don’t work together, we’re all going to die together.”
The irate Irish earl frowned more deeply but looked less homicidal. On the other hand, at the arctic rate his mood was changing “Agreed!” barked the other Irish leader, the taller one who had been in Sherrilyn’s sights. “We work together, leave together, sort it out afterwards.”
“Done,” said Harry — Just as the first of the Spanish came charging in through the same doorway that Harry had used, the one that led back to the staff quarters and the kitchen in St. Isidore’s annex.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
John O’Neill, still half-blind with rage and distrust, had taken a step closer to the sassenach — who turned away, and leveled his up-time pistol at the oncoming Spanish. Two ear-splitting snaps-reports, but so unlike the hoarse, throaty roars of muzzle-loaders-dropped the first Spaniard who came through the door, a middle-aged man with a sergeant’s sash. The three with him brought up their own pieces, but the wide-barreled carbines of Lefferts and one of his men were already trained on the doorway. Their discharge was thunderous, painful within the close, walled space-and John checked to be sure that the weapons had not, in fact, exploded. But the effects were clear enough: the cuirass of the first Spanish soldier was riddled by holes, and, as he went backward, a wide spray of blood preceded his fall. One of the two behind him must have picked up a ball, as well; his left arm buckling as the impact pulled him in that direction, the Spaniard’s own piece discharged, sending a lead ball spalling off the antechamber floor, through a window and whining out into the arboretum. The discharge of the second up-time weapon-another of these slim yet monstrously powerful musketoons-followed an eye blink behind the first. It made a red ruin of the wounded soldier’s head and arms, and must have clipped the third in the leg; he dropped with a moan. That sound was cut short by a single shot from the woman-the woman? — with Lefferts’ band; the Spaniard crumpled backward.
John knew he should act, should do something productive, but for the moment, all he could do was think: A woman? John had heard the rumors, but refused to believe them. A woman? Traveling with soldiers-no, raiders-in the field? How did they all-?
Noise. It came from just beyond the side-door of the rectory, the one that led out into the small garden that was tucked into a small niche between buildings of the annex. The Spanish would have had to climb a wall to get there this quickly, but “Lefferts, Owen-here!” John was moving as he snapped the order, leaping to the side of the door, drawing his sword in the same motion.
The door burst open even as he landed beside it. He saw a pistol in his face, snapped his wrist to convert his sword’s unsheathing into an abbreviated back-handed cut. Blood sprayed into his face at the same moment that thunder and powder-grit exploded against his reflex-shut eyes, and sent a bolt of searing lightning across the top of his right ear.
Which no longer worked.
He noticed.
As he fell.
Backward.
And landed with a crash that he felt rather than heard, but it jarred him out of his daze.
Just in time to gasp as someone fell on top of him. Weapons were discharging above and around John as he pushed the person-well, the body-off of him. Judging from its half-severed hand, it was the corpse of the Spaniard-the captain of the guard, from the look of his blood-spattered gear-who had almost shot him in the face. But John’s sword slice had not been what had killed the hidalgo: three perfectly round holes in his cuirass were clearly the cause of death. And the only person near enough to have done the shooting was the woman, who was already stepping sideways to get a better angle out into the garden. Staggering forward one step, John surveyed the situation out there, saw a knot of swordsmen entangled just beyond the door, and smiled.
At last: the perfectly uncomplicated and spine-tingling rush of combat. Oh, how I’ve missed it he thought, as he headed for the melee with great, bounding strides…
At least that bigoted Irish bastard isn’t dead; there would’ve been hell to pay for that, reflected Thomas as he swapped magazines and took stock of the situation.
In addition to the three Spaniards he and Sherrilyn had gunned down, four more had been killed coming in from the kitchen and pantry area, and three more by the rectory’s garden door where-for some idiotic reason-the earl and a few of his bog-hoppers had gone outdoors to have a little sword fight. But Matija and Sherrilyn were moving in that direction, too, and they’d be sure to make a quick end of that little machismo-induced melee. Of greater concern was the doorway that led from the rectory anteroom into the short corridor leading to the apse of the church. That was where most of the on-duty guards would no doubt fall-back, make a plan…
Which would involve a flanking maneuver. Probably making use of the same arboretum through which North had entered, since it was easily accessed from the front of the church. But that flanking move would be a feint only. The widest, yet shortest approach route was through the anteroom corridor linking to the apse “Harry-”
“Yeah, I know. You take Felix and George, as well as any Irish that aren’t needed in the rectory, and cover the corridor to the church. Donald, Gerd, and I will set up a cross fire in the arboretum; they’ll be coming that way, too.”
Thomas waved to George. “You heard Harry; on me, Sutherland. And you-” he turned to a particularly well-groomed Irishman who had just recovered his pepperbox revolver “-how are you with a sword?”
“I’m better with a scalpel.”
Thomas stared, then realized, judging from the easy, elegant diction, that this “bog-hopper” was telling the truth. “Then get in the rear, Doctor, and order your two mates here to cover this door. Swords and pistols, and stand to the side until I say; they’ll come hard, when they do. George, Felix, either side of the door. Shotguns out, pistols ready. Doctor, do be good enough to watch the door leading back into the main annex. If you detect any-”
Shotguns started firing rapidly out in the arboretum; the fast-paced BOOM-thra-thunk-BOOM-thra-thrunk sequence was consistent with a rapid pumping of double-aught rounds downrange.
Thomas edged close to the apse-hallway door, cheated it open a sliver And saw the double-doors at the apse-end of the corridor swing wide, the Spanish bursting through them three abreast, swordsmen in the lead, musketeers behind.
He let them come half the twenty feet. Then he pulled open the antechamber door. Too far into their charge and too far away from cover to settle in for a gun battle, the Spanish came harder, the musketeers shouting for clearance, hoping to get a shot.