The Last Four Things

22

At the Golan Heights the victorious Redeemers celebrated even more grimly than was their custom. It had been hard, shoving, hacking, killing work and they were exhausted. Tired as he was, Cale could not sleep and he called a pair of guards to bring a captive he had noticed being brought into the camp, the jovial scout he had met out on the plains three weeks, but what felt like a thousand years, before. He left his hands tied in front of him and his feet tied to the chair then told the guards to leave completely – he didn’t want any earwigging to what he was about to say.

‘What about loosening my hands?’ said Fanshawe. ‘It’s not very relaxing talking to someone with your hands tied.’

‘I don’t care whether you’re relaxed or not. I want to make an indent with you.’

‘Sorry?’

‘A deal – an agreement.’

‘About?’

‘We have five hundred prisoners. Their outlook is gloomy. I want to let you take two hundred and fifty out of here and try to escape and make your way home.’

‘Sounds like a trap.’

‘I suppose so. It isn’t.’

‘Why should I trust you?’

‘What you can trust, Fanshawe, is that by midday tomorrow there’ll be two types of Laconic prisoners: the dead ones and the ones going to die.’

He let Fanshawe consider this.

‘Some people would say it’s as well to die facing up to it as it is acting the goat in some game.’

‘It’s not a game.’

‘How do I know that?’

‘Do I seem playful to you?’

‘Not really.’

‘I have my reasons you don’t need to know anything about. How long will it take to get to the border?’

‘Four days, unopposed.’

‘You won’t be opposed because I’ll be following you – a few miles behind.’

‘Why?’

‘There you go again.’

‘You have to admit it sounds pretty fishy.’

‘It sounds pretty fishy.’

Fanshawe sat back and sighed.

‘No.’

‘What?’ For the first time in their conversation Cale was on the back foot.

‘They won’t leave half their number behind.’

‘Let me persuade you to change your mind. You will be executed tomorrow and I can’t stop it. You should already be dead.’

‘Me?’ said Fanshawe, smiling. ‘I was convinced when you mentioned the word execution. But the other Laconics won’t see it like that. It’s not in their nature – and if I try to persuade them to betray each other I won’t be making it as far as tomorrow. You don’t have something to drink, do you?’

Cale poured a mug of water and held it to Fanshawe’s lips. ‘Another would be luverly.’ Again Cale did as asked.

‘How do I know I can trust you to keep going and not to try to make a fight of it once you’re free of the camp?’

‘We haven’t been paid to take on a guerrilla war,’ said Fanshawe. ‘As long as we can leave honourably, which is to say not one half leaving the other half in the lurch, we’re duty-bound to return home as quickly as possible. We are possessions of the state, and very expensive ones.’

He said nothing for a moment.

‘How many of us died today?’

Cale considered lying.

‘Eight thousand. Roughly.’

This seemed to shock even Fanshawe. He went pale and did not speak for a while.

‘I’ll be straight with you.’

Cale laughed.

‘No, I will.’

‘We cannot replace so many in twenty years. We need this five hundred, every one of them, back home. There won’t be any revenge attacks.’

‘I couldn’t care less what you do once you’re over the border and arrange to bring me and up to two hundred of my men with you. That’s what we’re agreeing. I release all of the prisoners. You make sure we get safely across the border.’

‘If my hands were free I’d shake on it.’

‘Not a chance.’

‘I agree,’ lied Fanshawe.

‘I agree,’ lied Cale, in return. They discussed the details and within an hour Fanshawe was back with the other Laconics.

Cale went through the deal with Vague Henri and left him to stand down the Purgators guarding the Laconics, tied hand and foot in a small stockade built for no more than fifty captives – prisoners not normally being a problem for the Redeemers. The Purgators were replaced with an assortment of cooks, clerks and other highly unsuitable persons and the same was done with the soldiers guarding the horses the Laconics would need to make their escape; Cale announced a celebration to be held as far from the stockade as was feasible and supplied it with enough sweet sherry as could be got.

The escape itself was as undramatic as could be hoped except for the poor cooks and bottle-washers about whose fate no more sadly needs to be said. Vague Henri met Fanshawe as he came over the wall of the stockade with the five hundred-odd Laconics he had released from the ropes that bound them using the knife Cale had given him. As silently as an exaltation of swans they made their way to the hapless guardians of the horses and in ten minutes were leading their stolen mounts away from the Redeemer camp and on their way towards the Golan Heights and through the site of their recent so disastrous defeat.

By virtue of a deliberate failure to make it clear who was responsible for taking over the following watch of the stockade and the horses, it was daylight before the escape was discovered. On being informed, Cale pretended to threaten every kind of death and torture for those responsible before ordering instant preparations for pursuit of the Laconics by the Purgators, led by himself swearing to undo this blot on his reputation personally. If there were awkward questions to be asked no one asked them and by nine o’clock Cale, Vague Henri and some two hundred or so Purgators were off in pursuit weighed down with what might in other circumstances be considered a suspiciously excessive quantity of supplies for a chase of this kind.

Gil or Bosco would also have asked why Cale was taking along Hooke, someone who could be of no possible value in such circumstances. Just before he left, a message arrived from Bosco congratulating him on his victory, setting out briefly the events in Chartres and ordering him to return immediately if the victory permitted. He handed the letter to Vague Henri.

‘Odd. I wonder what’s going on.’

‘Let’s hope we never get the chance to find out.’

‘Will you reply?’

‘Best.’

Instructing the messenger not to leave until the following day, Cale wrote a quick response lying, as was his usual habit, with as much of the truth as possible – that a number of Laconics had escaped and he feared that they might meet up with those who had fled the battle and possibly make a counter-attack. With this in mind he had ordered trenches dug for a major defence and decided to pursue the escaped either to destroy them or at least be sure that they were returning to the border and not planning further attacks on Chartres. With luck it would be several days before Bosco worked out what was happening and he, Vague Henri and Hooke would be well clear. There remained two problems: the danger of pursuing twice their number of troops and ones with a powerful reason to turn on them if they learned the truth; and what he would say to the Purgators once they realized they had, instead of being welcomed back into the fold of the Redeemers, become outcasts again?

On the second night of the chase Cale had demanded that Fanshawe light a small beacon so that he could check on his position without coming too close by daylight, something which would involve some tricky explanations to the Purgators if he did not attack. He sent Vague Henri ahead to spot the fire and on his return was surprised to discover that Fanshawe had done as he agreed.

‘I didn’t think he’d stick to his bargain.’

‘He did and he didn’t. The beacon wasn’t in their camp – it was just two Laconics on their own.’

‘He could be miles away.’

‘Could be, but isn’t. I arrived as they were changing guards and followed the watchmen. Fanshawe and the rest of them are about four miles away.’

‘Murderous arse-bandits who keep their word. Odd bunch.’

‘When are you going to tell the Purgators?’

‘Tomorrow. If they don’t kill us we’ll have the whole day.’

‘Rather you than me.’

‘Now I think about it, you’d better keep your distance. See how it goes. Badly and you can take off – have the ’scope.’

‘That’s very generous.’

‘I’m a generous person.’

They both laughed but Vague Henri didn’t say yes or no.

The next morning after most of the Purgators had eaten a breakfast of porridge mixed with dried fruit, pot-walloped by Cale as an alternative to the dead men’s feet that some of the Purgators still preferred, he called them together. Ten minutes earlier he had watched as Vague Henri had ridden out of camp both nodding goodbye to each other as he did so. Just as he leapt up onto a rock to talk to the Purgators Vague Henri came wandering back into camp and dismounted. With another nod Cale simply stared at him for a few moments. But now he had other things on his mind. He began to regret not just legging it with Vague Henri during the night. On the other hand, the chances of two people making it across such heavily guarded borders didn’t look any better. Was this the least worst of two bad choices?

‘You, my Lord Redeemers, know me as well as I know every one of you. On all occasions,’ he lied, ‘I have told you everything it was possible to tell you straight and plain.’ There was a general murmur of agreement that this indeed was true.

‘Two days ago I lied to you.’

Another murmur. ‘Pretty good,’ thought Vague Henri from his perch at the back and with the safety catch of his crossbow loose and lying out of sight behind him on the grass.

‘But it was a lie I made only to save your lives.’ He waved the paper not unlike the one he had received from Bosco in the air. ‘This is a letter, more poisonous than a toad, from Bosco – a man I trusted more than my life itself and on whose word I risked your lives and lost so many who were dear to us, men who had suffered next to you in war and in the House of Special Purpose. This letter attempts to draw us together in a plot against the Pontiff that we love, to kill those dear to him and turn the One True Faith into who knows what toxic lies Bosco is ashamed even in the presence of these other treacheries to write.’

The letter was not the one from Bosco but a fake that Cale had bodged together with Vague Henri. The truth of Bosco’s betrayal might have been just as corrosive to his reputation among the Purgators but the real letter implicated Cale as much. The Purgators were silent now, many had gone white. Cale detailed the names of the newly dead in Chartres – all true enough, it should be said, and watched eyes on every face as the Purgators to a man stood still as stumps asking themselves whether to believe the unbelievable.

‘I brought you here, a two-day ride, so that you can make a choice, and not be chained to the wheel with me as I make mine never to accept this disgrace. Each one of you must choose: return or leave with me. I promise now that he who has no stomach for this flight, let him depart. His parole and passport freeing him I’ll sign myself. Ten dollars in his purse that man will have, for in this dreadful division of our faith I would not want it on my mind to die in that man’s company who in his conscience would not die with us. Read this letter,’ he said, waving it towards them. ‘If it does not turn your blood to stone and make your choice. I saved you once and every one of you has paid me back a dozen times. The man who comes with me will be my brother – the man who leaves shall in his leaving still for ever be my friend. I’ll stand aside and let you read but make it quick – our flight is noted and the dogs are up.’ With that he jumped down, handed the letter to the nearest Purgator, and walked over to Vague Henri and sat down.

‘What will you do,’ asked Vague Henri, ‘if some of them decide to leave?’

‘Why not all?’

‘And make it through the rancorous priests, the dogs, all for a chance to knock on the door of the slaughterhouse of Chartres?’

‘They have the letter.’

‘And it’s almost true.’

They watched as the Purgators talked and read and talked and read.

‘Good speech,’ said Vague Henri.

‘Thank you.’

‘Not yours.’

‘I read it in a book in Bosco’s library.’

‘Do you remember the name?’

‘Not of the maker, no. I remember the book,’ he paused. ‘Tip of my tongue.’

‘Not very grateful ...’

‘Death to the French,’ Cale interrupted with satisfaction. ‘That’s what it was called.’

In the end Vague Henri turned out to be wrong. About twenty of the Purgators, to the great hostility of the remainder, decided to return. Cale stopped a row that could have turned ugly and took some pleasure in keeping his promises of parole and money. His reputation for integrity among the Purgators was one he valued. Besides, being seen to be honest in these matters would ensure that everyone who came with him would do so willingly. And indeed, seeing him prove his honesty, three more Purgators chose to leave. In five minutes they had collected their gear and were gone. Another five minutes and Cale, still with slightly more than a hundred and sixty men, was heading in the opposite direction having ensured that Vague Henri had let slip to one of the ringleaders of the departed the direction in which they were heading.

‘I’m amazed,’ said Hooke, as he left riding between Vague Henri and Cale, ‘that even a Purgator could let himself be fooled by such a palpable device.’

‘Keep your mouth shut,’ said Vague Henri.

‘What about me?’ said Hooke.

‘What about you?’ replied Vague Henri.

‘You may keep your ten dollars but I want a passport and a parole the same as you offered them.’

‘You?’ said Cale. ‘I own you from snout to whistle. You’re going nowhere.’

‘If I’m so grossly incapable I wonder it wouldn’t be a relief to see the back of me.’

‘I’m sure,’ said Cale, softly smiling and all the more menacing for it. ‘You can learn to see the world more like I do.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean that the next time I use one of your devices in a brew – you’re going to be two steps in front of me when it all kicks off.’

After two more days heading in the direction he’d asked Vague Henri to spill to the returning Purgators, Cale realized that those who remained would have been getting suspicious as to why they kept following the Laconics but not engaging them.

‘I am calling off this chase. With our band of brothers shaved by more than twenty, we are outnumbered three to one. The Antagonist border is close and with it Laconic reinforcements might be anywhere and lying in wait for us. We will head to Spanish Leeds.’

‘They are allies to the Antagonists,’ called out a Purgator.

‘Only in good weather. The Swiss are neutral in their nature – even when they offer help it never comes. Even so you must remove your cassocks before we cross – it’s no easy feat in any case – impossible if you’re dressed like this.’

‘You ask a great deal, Captain, to deny our faith.’

‘Keeping your mouth shut isn’t a denial of anything – just common sense.’

‘I thought we were brothers, Captain.’

‘And so we are. Just as I’m the eldest. Take your money and your pass and go. My promise is entente even now.’

‘I want to stay, Captain.’

‘No.’

‘I want to stay. I talk too much.’

‘I don’t. Leave.’

The rest of the Purgators, Cale could see, were shocked at the insolence shown to Cale and pleased by his arbitrary exercise of power. They were not used to the first and comforted by the second.

Realizing the entire mood of the Purgators was against him the man left quickly.

‘Should I follow him?’ said Vague Henri.

‘Follow him?’ replied Cale pretending not to understand.

‘You know what I mean.’

Cale shook his head.

‘You’ve grown very bloodthirsty in your old age.’

‘He’s just a Redeemer – the loyalty the pig farmer owes to the pig – right?’

Cale smiled. ‘You’ve been talking to Hooke. He’s a bad influence that man, as well as useless. As to the other, leave him alone. He’s too far from Chartres to do us any harm – even if he gets there. Which I doubt. I want you to take five men and let Fanshawe get a good look at you.’ He drew a few lines in the dust. ‘Then double back and we’ll wait for you here.’