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[Continuing chapter 12; this is another long one, and concludes this week]
Russell smiled tightly. “So you were right.” He walked briskly to the stairs. “You should be proud of your Cassandra-like qualities.” Travis flushed; Cassandra at least had tried to warn people about her predictions. “Up here,” Russell said, and began to climb.
The closet-sized room at the top of the stairs was dark; Russell lit a lamp. “I should knock a window into this wall,” he muttered. “I suspect I’m going to have someone in this room more or less full-time before long. Everybody’s hooking up telegraphs these days.” The telegraph itself was surprisingly small for such an important device, nothing more than a piece of polished wood with a metal bar mounted on it and wires running to the wall and up into the ceiling.
Russell released a catch and began tapping the lever. He paused, tapped again, then clamped the lever back down again. “Nothing,” he said. “They’ve cut the wires. Nobody in the great wide world will know what’s going on here.” He smiled again, and said, “This is far more organized than I’d have thought Reynolds was capable of.” Then his smile straightened out. “They’ll be coming here, won’t they? They’ll be wanting my press.”
“That’s my guess. If you want to stay free, we should probably go.” Travis shook his head. “I think I’ll have to leave the city. If the garrison’s come out for Reynolds, I’m going to have to find soldiers from the frontier forts if I want to take the city back. Fort Lewis is probably closest.”
“Three or four days of hard riding,” Russell said, “and probably a week to get any soldiers back here. Can you wait that long?”
“We’ll have to worry about that once we’re outside the city,” Travis said. Having decided what needed to be done, he now felt a powerful compulsion driving him to act rather than talk. He grabbed Russell’s sleeve and pulled him out of the telegraph room and to the top of the stairs. “Do you have a horse I could ride? I’ve brought my carriage, and any mounted man could catch us in that.”
“I’ve got a horse, but she’s not saddled. I could loan you a saddle from out back, though it’s an old one and not too comfortable.”
“I’ve got a better idea,” Travis said. “We’ll borrow from your gentleman visitors.” He ran down the stairs and to the front door, saw the horses waiting patiently outside. “Still here,” he breathed. “Thank God for that, at least.”
“You get mounted, then,” Russell said. “I’m going to get my boys to hide the type and disable the press. Nobody’s going to use the Courier to justify treason, not if I have any say in the matter.”
Travis opened the door and cautiously poked his head into the morning sunlight. The street was completely deserted, but in the distance he could hear a rumble of noise that might be shouting. He prayed that it be the sound of patriots defending the republic.
Then soldiers appeared from around a corner two blocks down. There were a half-dozen of them, and they were accompanied by at least a dozen civilians, most carrying muskets or pistols of one sort or another. “Russell,” Travis called. His throat felt tight. “We have to go, Russell. Now.” He untied one of the horses and climbed into the saddle. The beast stirred at the unfamiliar weight and scent; Travis prayed that the horse wouldn’t smell his fear.
“I got him!” A wild-eyed man in a bottle-green coat came around the far corner of the Courier building and, spotting Travis, dashed toward him. He grabbed just as Travis kicked out at him; the man dodged the kick, then clutched at Travis’s booted foot. “Get off that horse, you God-blasted traitor,” he spat, tugging at Travis’s leg.
“Traitor? Damn you!” The words spilled out unbidden, the accusation a frigid shock. “You treasonous bastard, I’m trying to save this country!”
“Help me, boys!” the man shouted, struggling to pull Travis from the saddle. “He’s trying to escape!” The soldiers and their accompanying mob were running now; a few more seconds and they could shoot him down if they decided it was more trouble that it was worth to take him alive. Where are you, Russell? Travis screamed silently. Your precious type isn’t worth our lives.
Then the door banged open and Russell bounded across the wooden sidewalk, grimacing as he hefted a small canvas sack above his head. The sack came down on the assailant’s head with a muffled crack, and the man collapsed like a shot stag. Travis’s horse danced nervously into the center of the street, Travis pulling on the reins to keep the animal from bolting. Then Russell was mounted and Travis gave the horse its head; the animal galloped southward, away from the approaching soldiers, just as something hummed overhead and a loud crack announced the first shot.
“Took you long enough,” Travis gasped as they bounded away from their pursuers, bent low; Travis’s back itched with that curious anticipation of a wound that he hadn’t felt in nearly ten years, the memory of battle suddenly flooding back into him.
“Had to make sure the lads could hide or remove the type and get away themselves,” Russell said. He hefted the sack, which clanked dully. “This is my share. I’ve probably ruined it on that Sassenach’s fool head. Not that I’m likely to have a press to come back to; those bastards will destroy it if they can’t use it, I’m sure of that.”
“If we survive this,” Travis said, “a grateful government will buy you a damned press.” He looked over his shoulder as they left the last of Washington behind; dust suggested that one or two of their would-be captors had found horses, but he was confident now that they’d escaped the trap—for the time being at least.
“I wonder,” he said as he slowed his horse to a trot, “how far we’ll have to run?”
Next Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six
Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve
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