Paul Hoffman - The Left Hand of God

“They’re not Redeemers,” said Kleist. “Whatever they are. Best just to let’s see what happens.”

As they watched, more men came over the top of the hillock, but they were on horses and leading behind them thirty more. The riders caught up with the men on foot, who then themselves mounted, and within less than a minute, fifty or so bad-tempered cavalrymen surrounded the four of them. Half of them dismounted and began examining the remains of the bodies. The others, swords drawn, just stared at the four.

One of the cavalrymen looking at the bodies called out: “Captain, it’s the Embassy from Arnhemland. This is Lord Pardee’s son.”

The captain, a large man on an enormous horse nearly twenty hands high, moved it forward and dismounted. He walked over to Cale and without pausing fetched him such a hefty blow to the face that the boy crashed heavily to the ground.

“Before we execute you, I want to know who ordered this.”

Dazed and in pain, Cale did not answer. The captain was about to add a kick of encouragement when Vague Henri spoke up.

“It was nothing to do with us, Lord. We only came on them just now. Do we look as if we could have done this?” Henri thought it best to tell the truth. “We only have one knife between us. How could we?”

The captain looked at him and then back at Cale. Then he delivered a hefty kick to Cale’s stomach.

“Fair enough. We won’t cut your throats for murder-we’ll do it for looting.”

He looked over at the small pile of things they had collected from whatever the killers had missed-a bag, a plate, some kitchen knives and dried fruit as well as the brass knuckle duster. Henri could see that it looked bad.

“One of them’s still alive. We were just about to dig him out,” Henri pointed to the now unconscious man who, more than ever, looked like a severed head in the dust.

Quickly the soldiers surrounded him and began digging at the sand and gravel.

“It’s Chancellor Vipond,” said one of them. The captain waved them to stop and knelt down, taking out a flask of water. Gently he poured a little into the unconscious man’s mouth. He coughed, spitting all the water back.

By now one of the soldiers had brought forward a pair of shovels, and within five minutes they had eased the man out of the sand and laid him on the ground. There was much listening to his heart and checking him for wounds.

“We were going to save him,” said Henri, as Cale looked at the captain malevolently from his pitch in the dust.

“That’s what you say. All I know for sure is that you’re a bunch of thieves. No reason not to sell the girl and kill you three.”

“Don’t be unreasonable, Captain Bramley, darling,” called out a man’s voice from behind a mounted cavalryman’s horse. That he was not one of them was clear from the fact that he did not wear a uniform and that both his hands were tied and hung from a rope knotted to the saddle of the horse in front of him.

“Shut your big gob, IdrisPukke,” said the captain.

But IdrisPukke was clearly not a man to do as he was told.

“Be wise for once, Captain, darling. You know that Chancellor Vipond and me go back time out of mind. He wouldn’t take kindly, I’d say, to you killing three young men who’d tried to save him. What do you think?”

The captain looked uncertain for the first time. IdrisPukke dropped the mocking tone. “He’d want the chance to make up his own mind. That’s for certain.”

The captain looked down at the unconscious man, now being put onto a stretcher with a rolled blanket under his head. He looked back at IdrisPukke.

“One more word out of you and, I swear to God, I’ll disembowel you where you stand. Understand me?”

IdrisPukke shrugged but wisely, thought Vague Henri, said nothing. “Grady! Fog!” the captain called out to two soldiers. “Stay close to this gobshite. And if he even looks like he’s going to try and escape, blow his bloody head off.”

Captain Bramley just tied the hands of the three boys and let them walk and occasionally run behind the horses. However, as a punishment for IdrisPukke, he kept him tied to a saddle and, in response to his mocking pleas to be allowed to ride in the arms of a cavalryman like the girl, administered numerous kicks for his trouble.

They made camp about half an hour before dark. Riba was left free with the cavalrymen, who were given a bad-tempered warning by Bramley not to touch her. These were hard men who had seen and done much, a great deal of it too unpleasant to tell, but the warning was barely needed for most of them. While some would happily have done mischief to the beautiful young girl, most seemed entranced by her as she chatted and joked with them, artlessly flirting and opening her eyes in amazement at the endless supply of stories that any soldier delighted in telling. Despite a number of sympathetic looks over at the boys, she had been told to steer clear of them and that any attempt to talk would mean she’d be tied up.

Instead they had IdrisPukke as a companion, all four of them chained to the axle of a carriage that had joined up with the cavalry shortly after their capture. The boys had been fed but not IdrisPukke, who was given a kick instead of bully beef and soda bread. They were starving and began to gobble the lot as quickly as dogs.

“What about sharing some of that?”

“Why should we?” said Kleist from behind a stuffed mouth.

“Oh, because I interceded on your behalf when that bastard Bramley wanted to spill your guts onto the oh-so-hungry sands of the Scablands.”

Kleist quickly finished his last mouthful.

“Sorry about that-but thanks for this afternoon.”

The other two were more gracious, even if Cale was only willing to offer his soda bread because he wanted to question IdrisPukke.

Unlike the boys, IdrisPukke took his time over the bread and the small amount of bully beef left by Vague Henri.

“Do you know anything about the killings?” asked Cale.

“Me?” said IdrisPukke. “I was going to ask you the same thing.” He took another bite of the soda bread. “Were you going to help Vipond?”

There was a pause as Vague Henri and Cale looked at each other.

“We were thinking about it,” said Cale.

“Very wise. Always think carefully before doing anyone a favor. Good advice. In your friend’s case,” he added, nodding at Kleist, “I wish I’d taken it.”

“You’d have gone without your dinner if you had.”

IdrisPukke laughed softly. “Not much of an exchange-two pieces of bread for three lives. I’d say you still owed me.”

“There’s nothing we can do for you,” said Vague Henri.

“Perhaps not. But in future I may have to call it in. I hope you’re honorable men.”

Cale laughed.

“Are you an honorable man?”

“You’d be laughing on the other side of your face if I wasn’t.”

Vague Henri thought it best to change the subject.

“What do you think they’ll do to us?”

IdrisPukke shrugged. “They’ll take you to Memphis. If Vipond lives, you should be all right.” He smiled. “As long as you stick to your story.”

“And if he doesn’t?” asked Vague Henri.

“Depends. They might put you on trial or they might just throw you in the bypass.”

“What’s that?”

“Somewhere you get forgotten about.”

“We didn’t do anything,” said Cale.

“So I gather.” He laughed again. “But don’t tell them that.”

“Who do you think killed them?”

IdrisPukke considered.

“There are lots of hooligans in the outer Scablands, but not many would think of touching an armed embassy from the Materazzi.”

“Who are they?”