Chapter 37

We closed the place up around nine and went to bed. Terri had overdone it working the inn and she wasn't all that sexy about getting naked. I wasn't up to snuff either and all I did was kiss her goodnight and tell her to wake me at midnight if she happened to wake up around then.

Hell, I didn't have a bit of trouble waking myself up right on the dot. I dressed and rousted Johnny and Jimmy out and we left the inn via the back door. We were going to hike down to the colonel's place and we didn't intend to go right up to the gate and ask any questions.

I guess I wasn't being all that heroic on this trip, but I'd had pretty good information the Damsel was being held in this town and I didn't know of another place around here she could be. Of course I could have been more diligent in my examinations, but then again this was a good bet and the colonel seemed like an asshole buddy of the mayor's anyway. I doubted he was doing the town all that much good.

When we ran into a rail fence I sent Johnny and Jimmy over it to scout the territory and I told them I'd be near the guard gate just off the road. I was surprised when I made it near the place because there were two lights burning inside the gatehouse and I could hear conversation going on. I couldn't hear what they were saying, but I could hear them laughing and joking around.

I'd meant to just keep an eye out for the guards, but of course after a few minutes I had to try slipping up closer to see if I could gain any information from what they were saying. With the lights inside the building I didn't have hardly any fear of being seen. As long as I stayed quiet I thought I'd be ok.

"What the colonel don't know won't hurt him. I can just look out across the grounds and see just as much as if I was walking a patrol," a voice from inside the guard building said.

"Hell, I hear you. I'll be doing the same thing when it's my turn to walk the watch, unless Jenkins is on duty here in the guardhouse. He's a real stickler for having us walk the patrol."

"Yeh, he's a bastard all right. I wonder just who in the hell they think is going to come bothering this place. It'd be suicide with all the men we have."

"Twenty five fighting men is a bunch, especially with the way the colonel's house is built. It's all out of stone and the only way in is the front door or our entrance in the back, and there's plenty of men guarding both ways."

"Not to mention the twelve he makes stay in that out building every night. I'm due out there for the next six days after tonight. Oh well, at least there ain't even a sham of patrolling from in there. With those solid walls it's real quiet inside and no one bothers you," he said.

Johnny patted me on the back just then and when I turned around I saw Jimmy was with him. I motioned back toward town and we slipped away and trotted back after we were about five hundred yards from the guardhouse.

We were nearly back to the inn before I remembered the colonel's horse still tied out front. I went around to fetch it and we stripped off the tack and the crossbow tied to the back of the saddle. I slapped it on the ass when we had it stripped down and we carried what we'd gained inside the inn.

When we were in the common room I poured us all a cup of wine and we discussed what we'd learned. Johnny and Jimmy had seen things just about exactly as the loudmouth at the gate had told. They'd spied the outbuilding where the twelve men were supposed to be guarding, but apparently they were just sleeping out there since there was no light from the building.

Things were better than I could have hoped for. With only two men awake we should have an easy time of it. Even if one man was patrolling around he should be easy enough to take care of and the man in the guard post should be duck soup. It still left twelve men inside the house, or ten anyway after today. Some of them might be real fighting men, but my guess was several of them were just farm boys who thought carrying a sword made them fighters.

We broke up our little pow wow and headed back to bed around three am. I managed to make it into bed without waking Terri and I was asleep quickly.

She woke me just as the sun was coming up and I got up, put my clothes back on and headed downstairs with her. Janey was already in the kitchen with a fire in the stove and she had some hot tea made. I was glad to get a cup.

Within an hour the breakfast trade started showing up and Terri started doling out bowls of the gruel. I didn't really know what it contained, but I'd had a bowl yesterday and I was happy enough when she brought me one this morning too. She had even put a couple of fried eggs on top of it for me and I dug in when it came.

The morning crowd was quiet and didn't cause any trouble. I even took time off to go back into the kitchen to see if they had any bread. When I found a couple of loaves Janey said were left over from yesterday I cut off two thick slices, slathered them with butter and fried a couple more eggs. When they were done I slid them on top of the bread slices and gobbled it down.

"Hey, that looks good. I might serve it for a little extra some day," Janey said.