Chapter 22: New Brunswick

My trip to New Brunswick encouraged Captain Foster to plan a raid on the German headquarters in our area. "No sense a'waiting in the cold for them to come out," he said. "We can go right in an' gig 'em."

It sounded good, and I described the barracks they had and the officers' quarters. I guess there were about forty or fifty of them stationed right in the town and more out in scattered posts. We had a dozen men, and the odds did not seem exactly grand to me. Captain Foster said he did not expect for us to get them all the first time, but he thought that a couple of hit and run raids would do us good. "You're getting fat and lazy," he announced with a smile.

So we cooked up some rations, looked to our weapons, and headed for New Brunswick, looking at each other kind of sourly as we did. We did not mind ambushing Redcoats or Hessians, but we sure did not want a fair fight with them.

I thought that the captain would have us make a dawn raid, but he decided that the mid-day meal would be the best time for real confusion. It was a cold, dry day, and the smell of food reached us went we were still a half-mile from the target. George and I got chosen to ride in and toss some grenades through the widows of the mess hall while Foster and the boys waited behind the houses across the way for the Germans to rush out, unarmed, into our volley fire of buck and ball.

George and I rode through the town's outskirts, mostly small homes with gardens in the back, lit our fuses from George's pipe, and trotted down parallel streets toward the target. George must have been riding faster because I heard a window crash before even reached the back of the barracks. I looked at my bomb, and it still had a good inch of fuse so I kicked my horse, tossed the thing through a back window and yanked the reins to turn away.

My grenade went in among the dinners and exploded almost at once, but George's did a lot more damage because he had tossed his into a store room where it started a fire and cartridges were still exploding a half hour later. I dismounted, as planned, and prepared to shoot down anyone escaping toward the back. The first man out that narrow door and down the steps was on fire so I let him run and shot the second one right in the doorway. He crumpled, and I reloaded, watching the burning man roll in the snow. Since no one else seemed to be headed for the back door and there was a lot of shooting out front, I walked up and bayoneted the burned man in the chest, probably saved him a lot of pain.

As I pulled out my blade, a soldier in shirt sleeves came running around the back of the officers' quarters, yelling, so I shot him down. I do not think he even noticed me. Behind him came two more who jumped over their comrade's body and ran right at me. I stopped them both with my old pistol's load of buckshot and finished them with the big bayonet while they lay writhing and yelling in the bushes. It was easier than killing rabbits, and I must admit I felt much the same about it.

I ran back toward my horse as the shooting seemed to be dying down. We had only been ordered to take three well-aimed shots before dispersing so I figured I had done my job. A young boy stood holding my horse's reins and leading him away.

"He came loose," the boy said, looking guilty and shuffling his feet, ready to run.

"And you were going to save him for me, right?" I said, with a smile.

"Leave him be, y'big bully," said a light voice from behind me. I spun, bayonet-tipped musket extended and found myself looking at a fair young woman with a fine smile and a big pistol. She lowered her weapon, and I lowered mine.

"Stable him, Sammy," she said to the boy and "Come in here, y'big lunk," she said to me. Since the neighborhood was starting to swarm with soldiers in blue coats, I took her advice.

"He might'a stole your horse," she said, "specially if you got yourself shot up there. We need the money."

"I need to get back to my camp. We've stirred up a bees' nest."

"Sounds like," she said, as heavy-booted feet trotted past and guttural curses filled the street. Sammy returned though a narrow back door and smiled at me. I dug out a shilling and tossed it to him. He snatched it out of the air and bit it.

"You hungry?" the girl asked. I suppose she was maybe twenty, and I was not real sure whether she was the boy's mother or sister. Turned out she was his aunt. I shrugged off my light knapsack and shared what I had with them. We ate pretty well and spent some time peeking through the curtains at the scrambling Germans and listening to the bangs of ammunition going off in the burning barracks.

By sunset things calmed down, and Sammy went back out to do whatever boys his age did in the twilight in a town full of alien soldiers. The girl, whose name I've forgotten, came and sat on my lap and put her hands around my neck. She rested her fair head on my chest and let me pat her back and thigh for awhile. The only light came from the hearth. I wish I could recall her name.

"Come," she said at length, "come and make love to me."

That was an invitation I seldom refused, especially after a spate of killing, survival must have had a role in that feeling. The small house was only one room with the beds tucked in the corners on the chimney side. She led me to hers, turned back the quilt and smiled up at me.

"I've been staying out of sight since they came," she said, untying her bodice while I took off my heavy belt and then stripped off my long-tailed shirt. "I was raped several times a year or so ago, when this bunch first got here."

I shook my head and admired her young, lush body with its full curves and deep valleys.

"My lord," she gasped, looking my chest and shoulders. "Turn around. Oh, that's even worse." She touched some of the places, traced the stripes and then kissed my back in several places. It felt very interesting. I grew impatient.

"Scratches, mostly," I said, sitting and pulling off my boots while I watched her undress and shuck off her shoes. She climbed in still wearing her long, plain shift. I pulled off my britches and followed her under the covers. We kissed and played for a while, and I rolled her shift up and then pulled it over her head. She laughed. "Think we'll be warm enough?" she said, putting one of her long legs between mine while I mouthed her full breasts.

"Damn," she said with a intake of air, "I haven't had many men, but I never felt anything like that. Go easy." Her young body heaved in response to my efforts, and after a bit, with more juices flowing, we managed to get fully joined. By then she was flat on her back with her knees up near my shoulders and her mouth gaping, head flopping from side to side and panting rapidly. I was rearing and snorting, doing my satyr imitation.

I heard the back door creak open at just about the time I arched up on my arms, ready for some real swiving.

"Rolfe wanted to see you," Sammy said. "What 'cha doing?"

I rolled out of bed and stood, growling and engorged. And there was Rolfe, a huge jaeger looking both surprised and happy, showing his yellow teeth. He was starting to laugh and just raising his musket when I butted him in the sterum and drove him back to the wall. I kneed him as hard as I could and yanked his spike bayonet from its scabbard as he dropped his rifle and wrapped his big arms around me, grunting and trying to get his breath. I stuck him in the thigh and then in the belly when he yelled and let go with one big hand. He screeched, released me completely and fell to his knees, trying to hold his perforated guts together. I stuck him again and yanked the bayonet loose.

I could hear Sammy behind me saying, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," as I drove the iron blade into the big German's back with both hands, and he fell on his face with much of the spike protruding from his chest. Only then did I notice that I was still very much erect and blood stained.

Sammy was sniffing and shaking. "He was my friend, gave me candy and things," the boy said. "I did errands for them."

I stepped over the body and knelt beside him. "Who else knows I'm here?" I asked, ignoring my heated member.

He shook his head, "Nobody, jus' Rolfe," he said.

I got dressed, went through the Hessian's pockets, and an hour later, when it was fully dark with the moon down and no light showing from neighbors' windows, I dragged his body halfway down the street toward the barracks while Sammy followed with a broom, covering up our bloody trail. I dumped the big body in a drainage ditch and took the boy home, assuring him it was not his fault.