Jane Feather - Violet

Pompous ass! Tamsyn shook her head in irritation but followed with Gabriel. In a small clearing in the cool, dim seclusion of the woods, they halted. The colonel gave soft-spoken commands to his scouts, and the two men dismounted and disappeared into the undergrowth.

“Might as well let 'em do it,” Gabriel said with a cheerful shrug, pulling out his wineskin. He threw back his head, and the dark-red stream arched from the neck of the skin and into his mouth.

“Colonel?” Aware of Julian's eyes on him, he offered the skin courteously.

“Thanks.” St. Simon took a welcome draft of the robust wine. As he handed it back to Gabriel, Tamsyn intercepted the skin and deftly drank herself.

Her teeth flashed pearly white as she opened her mouth and tilted her head back. Julian found himself gazing with rapt fascination at the graceful curve of her throat, the little movements as she swallowed the wine, the ruby stream pouring unbroken between her parted lips. The short cap of her hair was almost white in the gathering gloom, contrasting with the gold of her skin and the dark fringe of her eyelashes. She was like some barbarian maiden, he thought, sitting her magnificent warhorse with her rifle and her bandolier, one brown ungloved hand gripping the reins, her serviceable britches and shirt mud splattered, her boots of soft cordovan leather shabby and well-worn like the favorite riding boots of someone who spent most of her life in the saddle.

And yet there was something delicate about her too. Something distinctly flowerlike.

He dismissed this whimsy with a disgusted head shake and tore his eyes away from her. “Sergeant, the men may dismount and take a break while we wait for the scouts. They should eat, but we'll be lighting no fires. “

“Aye, sir.” The sergeant gave the order and the men dismounted with relief. It had been six hard hours ridding over ill-paved roads, and there was much stretching and cursing as they opened saddlebags and made what supper they could with cold provisions.

Gabriel and La Violette, however, remained on horseback, looking as comfortable as if they were in armchairs. Not for the first time Julian thought that the hard English saddles with their low pommels were a poor exchange for the high-cushioned Spanish type.

The scouts returned within the hour. The French under Cornichet were still in the encampment, about half an hour deeper into the woods, busily repairing the damaged huts. They had doubled the pickets, however, and another raid would be more difficult. Not least because the night promised to be clear and pleasant, and they wouldn't have the advantage of drenching rain and thick cloud cover.

Julian frowned. He was not prepared to lose any of his men over a personal vendetta. This would have to be done with stealth, not by force. “Sergeant, keep the men here. Keep your ears open, and be ready to come up in support at the first sound of trouble.”

He turned to Tamsyn. “You,” he said, pointing an imperative forefinger, “and Gabriel, come with me. If we can't do this with the three of us, then it won't be done.”

Tamsyn considered this. It seemed as if he were reneging on the bargain, but the bright-blue eyes were like diamond chips, the forceful mouth tight, the jutting chin set, and it rather looked as if this was the best she was going to get. But the colonel was no lightweight. She'd had ample evidence of his physical strength, and though he couldn't compete with Gabriel, he cut an impressive figure, exuding an internal power that made him an opponent to be reckoned with. And at least his men would be there to cover their retreat.

With an equable nod she dismounted, slinging her rifle over her shoulder. “We'd best approach on foot.”

They crept through the undergrowth, Julian, his scarlet tunic once again concealed beneath his black boat cloak, astonished at how Gabriel, despite his size, seemed to flit and melt into the brush. Tamsyn was like a fawn, her feet barely touching the ground, hardly crushing a blade of grass as she passed. He was not as practiced at this guerrilla warfare and felt like some clumsy great ox beside his companions.

They halted about fifty yards from the encampment, where they could see a patrolling picket. Another man joined him after a minute, his rifle resting against his shoulder. They spoke together and resumed their march in opposite directions.

Staging an ambush along the picket lines was not going to be easy. “How about the latrines?” Tamsyn whispered, her eyes shining wickedly in the now-full dark. “When Cornichet pays his nightly visit, we could be waiting for him. He's a creature of habit. Every evening at around eleven he goes to the jakes, taking a glass of cognac with him.”

“How do you know?” Julian peered at her in the gloom, infected, despite his attitude toward this time wasting and dangerous jaunt, by the wicked mischief emanating from the slight figure at his elbow.

Tamsyn grimaced. “I spent two and a half days tethered in his cabin, Colonel. I had ample opportunity to observe his routine.”

“Do you know where the jakes are situated?”

She nodded. “I was permitted to, use them-twice a day,” she added with a hiss of fury, remembering the discomfort and humiliation of her imprisonment.

Julian offered no response. If one played in a dirty world, one risked falling into the slime, and he didn't think La Violette was asking for sympathy. “So where are they?”

“The far side of the encampment, dug about ten feet within the picket line, but set apart from the main camp.”

“Lead on, Violette.” His expression was wry. Of all the crazy exercises he'd been involved in, this one took the prize. But this Spanish-Cornish bandit clearly had a fertile imagination when it came to devising the downfall of her enemies. Cornichet's plight would be almost as ludicrous as his own that morning, caught while taking his pleasure between the smooth thighs of a passionate plunderer.

Gabriel was grinning, much amused by Tamsyn's plot. But he too had suffered at the hands of Cornichet and his men.

They crept around the picket line. A twig snapped beneath Julian's boot, and the sound seemed to echo in the silence. Immediately Tamsyn cupped her mouth with her hands, and the haunting call of a nightjar filled the wood. Gabriel nodded his approval and Julian cursed his clumsiness.

The smell of smoke and smoldering embers still lingered in the air, and the wood was very quiet, its wildlife fled from men and fire. The trees were still leafless, and the crescent moon shone through the branches with an alarming brightness, but Gabriel and Tamsyn hugged the silvered trunks of trees, slithered on their bellies through bushes, and Julian followed them as they crawled and darted from dark patch to dark patch until they'd circled the outpost, and the faint odor of sewage wafted from beyond the picket line where the latrine trenches were dug.

“The officers' latrine is at the far end, closest to the camp,” Tamsyn whispered, her voice a 'mere breath on the air. “Their section has a canvas cover-as if what they do is any different from the common soldier,” she added with derision.

“I should imagine you were glad enough of the privacy,” Julian observed dryly, and was rewarded by a quick, rueful grin of acknowledgment. She was an infuriatingly opinionated girl, he reflected, but at least she knew when to yield an issue.

A staccato hail rang out from the picket line, and they dropped to the ground behind a thornbush. Tamsyn, squashed between the two men, slowly raised her head to look over the bush. There was another shout from the camp, and the colonel abruptly pushed her head down into the dirt.

“They haven't seen us,” she protested in a fierce whisper, struggling against the pressure of his hand. “They're changing pickets.”