Chapter IV: Rescue
Over breakfast, Guy and Lucien talked about their encounters with their Duchesses and for the first time Lucien told Guy a little about the storming of Negripellise. Before he left with Gaston to look for Captain Maubrant, Lucien sent his young lackey Bertin to keep watch on the Dog’s Head Tavern.
After breakfast Guy took a walk around town to familiarize
himself with Auxerre. He decided that he had best ensure that Bertin was
keeping a good watch on the Dog’s Head Tavern. As he paused in a side alley
before entering Auxerre’s main square, a dainty white hand dropped a note out
one of the windows on the top floor of a large building. Guy picked up the note
and quickly put it in his pocket as he automatically checked to ensure that no
one had noticed his action. Then he walked into the town square and casually
looked behind to note that the building concerned was Auxerre’s town hall. Guy
patted his pocket where he had placed the note as he thought; too many people about; this is neither the
time nor the place to examine this note. He acquired a dull brown cloak and
hat from a couple of vendor’s stalls. He used the crowd in the square to throw
off any possible pursuers, then carefully watched to see if he was being
followed. Safe for now, he donned the hat and cloak and continued on to the Marina
district.
Trying out his improvised disguise, Guy surprised Bertin who
he found tossing pebbles against the wall of an alley while he kept watch on
the Dog’s Head Tavern. For several hours the two watched the busy traffic along
the docks of the Yonne River. After watching one barge after another load or
unload, Guy prayed for something, anything to happen. I’ll light 10 candles in the cathedral if something interesting happens
in the next quarter hour. As if to answer his prayers two large men left
the Dog’s Head carrying an enormous sack between the two of them. “What do you
think they have there?” Guy asked.
“It looks like a big
sack of potatoes, Monsieur,” Bertin answered.
The two men tossed the sack onto a small, dilapidated barge
then grabbed the oars as they rowed into the center of the river and headed
downstream. “I think not,” Guy said as he walked towards the dock. Those aren’t potatoes, that’s a body. Reaching
the dock, he saw a man in a fishing boat. Guy hopped into the boat saying,
“Follow that barge!” He jingled his purse to emphasize his seriousness.
“Yes, Monsieur, the boatman said as he grabbed the oars and
pulled away from the dock.
“Don’t forget me, Monsieur!” Bertin said as he leapt into
the boat.
The oarsman, whose name was Pierre, rowed after the first
barge. “Don’t get too close,” Guy ordered. They followed the other barge for
miles and the sun was heading for the horizon as they reached a series of bends
in the river. Guy took an oar to help Pierre keep up with the other barge which
they eventually saw pull up to an old dock next to the ruins of an abbey. Guy
ordered Pierre to continue downstream past the abbey. They moored by a wood
while Guy bargained with the fisherman to remain there after dark while the
other two went ashore to investigate.
“Yes. We must be very careful,” Guy said. “Wait here. I’m
going to take a closer look.” Suiting action to words he moved closer. Using
the growing darkness and the limited cover of the field, he reached the ruined
wall of the abbey. From there, he could hear the riders speaking with the two
bargemen.
“Why didn’t you bring this one with the other,” asked one of
the riders.
“We didn’t have him then. He was caught asking questions and
sneaking around the Dog’s Head,” a bargeman replied.
“But the wagon has already left. We’ll have to watch him
until it returns.
“That’s not our lookout. He’s your problem now. We get paid
to bring the sleepers to you. He’s asleep. We brought him. And we want our
pay.”
“Pay them,” said a third voice.
Guy concluded that this prisoner was probably the agent of
Bishop Lomenie since he had been asking questions and sneaking about the Dog’s
Head. He decided to rescue the agent. He returned to the woods and told Bertin
the plan. “We can’t carry him, so we’ll have to wait until he wakes up. I’ll
return to the abbey. Wait for my signal.”
“What signal, Monsieur?” Bertin asked.
“Don’t worry. You’ll know it when you hear it,” Guy said.
Guy decided the time was right. He rose from
behind the wall and carefully tossed his purse, which he had filled with all
his spare gunpowder, into the Black Riders’ fire. Then he covered his face with
his arms. There was a brief delay, then an explosion and a tremendous flash of
flame which blinded the riders. Guy hopped over the wall and freed the
prisoner. One of the riders leveled a horse pistol at Guy and fired his shot
ricocheting off the stone wall. Guy’s return shot did not miss and the rider
fell.
At the explosion, Bertin cut the horses’ picket line then
yelled and slapped at the horses to make them run. Already frightened by the
explosion, the horses galloped away. But as he made his escape, Bertin was
grabbed by one of the riders. Bertin wriggled like an eel and managed to free
himself. He ran towards the ruined wall of the abbey with the rider in pursuit.
Bertin quickly ducked and crawled through a hole in the wall. The rider, his
eyes dazzled by the explosion, failed to see the wall and ran into it head
first allowing Bertin to make his escape across the field, with the sound of
gunfire at his back. Bertin ran into the woods to escape the gunfire, but
without the familiar church towers and shop signs of the city, he quickly
became lost in the woods.
“I thought we had something in common, Monsieur. I too…like
to travel. Depardieu explained that the last thing he remembered was drinking
at the Dog’s Head tavern.
“I must have passed out,” he said. “Which is strange, as I
have a good head for wine. That has never happened to me before.”
“The wine there must be unusually strong,” Guy said.
By this time, Guy was worried about the missing Bertin.
“Where is that boy? I must go back and make sure he didn’t get himself
captured. Please wait here,” he said as he again jingled his purse at Pierre. “I’ll
be back shortly.”
While Guy was searching for Bertin, the boy finally found
the barge. On learning that Guy was out looking for him, Bertin wanted to go
back and look for Guy, but Depardieu restrained him. “Best you wait here for
your friend boy. He seems like a man who can look after himself.”
Guy soon returned and, seeing that Bertin was back, he
ordered Pierre to head back upstream to Auxerre. He and Depardieu took turns
helping with the oars, but it was after 10 o’clock in the evening by the time
they returned. He paid Pierre and then insisted that Depardieu, who was missing
both money and belongings, should come to the Blue Bottle where Guy would see
to his lodging. Once he was in his inn room, Guy took out the mysterious letter
that had been tossed to him that morning, carefully opened, and read it.
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