The Admiral's Heart (8 page)

His face grim, the young gentleman knotted
his horse's reins and removed his gloves, pulling each one
carefully off by the fingertips. With a watchful eye on the
highwaymen, he slipped his feet from the irons and vaulted lightly
down from the thoroughbred's tall back, his glossy top boots of
Spanish leather landing in chalk mud up to his ankles. The horse
never moved. He doffed his fine new surtout and laid it over the
saddle along with his tricorn and gloves. He tucked the lace at his
wrist safely inside his sleeve to protect it from any soot or
sparks his pistol might emit. Then he crept through the knee-high
weeds and nettles that grew thick at the side of the road, priming
and loading the pistol as he moved stealthily toward the stricken
coach. He would have time to squeeze off only one shot before they
were upon him, and that one shot had to count.

~~~~

“Everybo'y out.
Now!
”

Holding Charlotte tightly against her,
Juliet managed to remain calm as the robber snared her wrist and
jerked her violently from the vehicle. She landed awkwardly in the
sticky white mud and would have gone down if not for the huge,
bearlike hand that yanked her to her feet. Perhaps, she thought
numbly, it was the very fact that it
was
bearlike that she
was able to keep her head—and her wits—about her, for Juliet had
been born and raised in the woods of Maine, and she was no stranger
to bears, Indians, and a host of other threats that made these
English highwaymen look benign by comparison.

But they were certainly not benign. The
slain driver lay face-down in the mud. The bodies of one of the
guards and a passenger were sprawled in the weeds nearby. A shudder
went through her. She was glad of the darkness. Glad that the poor
little children still inside the coach were spared the horrors that
daylight would have revealed.

Cuddling Charlotte, she stood beside the
other passengers as the robbers yanked people down from the roof
and lined them up in front of the coach. A woman was sobbing. A
girl clung pitifully to the old man, perhaps her grandfather. One
fellow, finely dressed and obviously a gentleman, angrily protested
the treatment of the women and without a word, one of the
highwayman stuck his pistol into his belly and shot him dead. As he
fell, the wretched group gasped in dismay and horror. Then the last
passengers were dragged from the coach, the two children clinging
to their mother's skirts and crying piteously.

They all huddled together in the rainy
darkness, too terrified to speak as, one by one, they were relieved
of their money, their jewels, their watches, and their pride.

And then the bandits came to Juliet.

“Gimme yer money, girl, all of it. Now!”

Juliet complied. Without a sound, she handed
over her reticule.

“The necklace, too.”

Her hand went to her throat. Hesitated. The
robber cuffed it away in impatience, ripping the thin gold chain
from her neck and dropping the miniature of Charlotte's dead father
into his leather bag.

“Any jewels?”

She was still staring at the bag. “No.”

“Any rings?”

“No.”

But he grabbed her hand, held it up, and saw
it: a promise made but broken by death. It was Charles's signet
ring—her engagement ring—the last thing her beloved fiancé had
given her before he had died in the fighting at Concord.

“Filthy lyin' bitch, give it to me!”

Juliet stood her ground. She looked him
straight in the eye and firmly, quietly, repeated the single
word.

“
No.
”

Without warning he backhanded her across the
cheek, and she fell to her knees in the mud, cutting her palm on a
stone as she tried to prevent injury to the baby. Her hair tumbled
down around her face. Charlotte began screaming. And Juliet looked
up, only to see the black hole of a pistol's mouth two inches away,
the robber behind it snarling with rage.

Her life passed before her eyes.

And at that moment a shot rang out from
somewhere off to her right, a dark rose exploded on the
highwayman's chest, and with a look of surprise, he pitched
forward, dead.

~~~~

Only one shot, but by God, I made it
count.

The other two highwaymen jerked around at
the bark of Gareth's pistol. Their faces mirrored disbelief as they
took in his fine shirt and lace at throat and sleeve, his silk
waistcoat, expensive boots, expensive breeches, expensive
everything. They saw him as a plum ripe for the picking, and Gareth
knew it. He went for his sword.

“Get on your horses and go, and neither of
you shall be hurt.”

For a moment, neither the highwaymen nor the
passengers moved. Then, slowly, one of the highwayman began to
smile. The other, to sneer.

"Now!”
Gareth commanded, still moving
forward and trying to bluff them with his display of cool
authority.

And then all hell broke loose.

Tongues of flame cracked from the
highwaymen's pistols and Gareth heard the low whine of a ball
passing at close range. Passengers screamed and dived for cover.
The coach horses reared, whinnying in fear. Gareth, his sword
raised, charged through the tangle of nettle that grew dense at the
side of the road, trying to get to the robbers before they could
reload and fire. His foot hit a patch of mud and he went down, his
cheek slamming into the stinging nettles. One of the highwayman
came racing toward him, spewing a torrent of foul language and
intent only on finishing him off. Gareth lay gasping, then flung
himself hard to the left as the bandit's pistol coughed another
spear of flame. Where his shoulder had been, a plume of mud shot
several inches into the air.

The brigand was still coming, roaring at the
top of his lungs, already bringing up a second pistol.

Gamely, Gareth tried to get to his feet and
reach his sword. He slipped in the wet weeds, his cheek on fire as
though he'd been stung by a hundred bees. He was outnumbered, his
pistol spent, his sword just out of reach. But he wasn't done for.
Not yet. Not by any stretch of the imagination. He lunged for his
sword, rolled onto his back, and sitting up, flung the weapon at
the oncoming highwayman with all his strength.

The blade caught the robber just beneath the
jaw and nearly took his head off. He went over backward, clawing at
his throat, his dying breath a terrible, rasping gurgle.

And then Gareth saw one of the two children
running toward him, obviously thinking he was the only safety left
in this world gone mad.

"Billy!
” the mother was screaming.
“Billy, no,
get back!
”

The last highwayman spun around. Wild-eyed
and desperate, he saw the fleeing child, saw that his two friends
were dead, and, as though to avenge a night gone wrong, brought his
pistol up, training it on the little boy's back.

“
Billeeeeeeee!”

Gareth lunged to his feet, threw himself at
the child, and tumbled him to the ground, shielding him with his
body. The pistol exploded at close range, deafening him, a
white-hot lance of fire ripping through his ribs as he rolled over
and over through grass and weeds and nettles, the child still in
his arms.

He came to rest upon his back, the wet weeds
beneath him, blood gushing hotly from his side. He lay still,
blinking up at the trees, the rain falling gently upon his
throbbing cheek.

His fading mind echoed his earlier words.
Well done, good fellow! Well done . . .

The child sprang up and ran, sobbing, back
to his mother.

And for Lord Gareth de Montforte, all went
dark . . .

# # #

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