CHAPTER TWO
Koch was the first to move. Vaulting past Mason, the big blond barreled into the shooter and drove him across the small room and into the rough wall. Mason came up screaming and followed Koch’s lead while Stratton went straight for the bastard with his pants undone. The tall, skinny German’s eyes widened as Mason charged and swung the butt of his rifle. The sickening crack shook Mason’s arms and the man went down to the floor without another sound. He spun to see Stratton flung to the floor by the larger man. The fat bastard stared at Mason and glanced to Mason’s right and stopped. Another crash sounded and Mason flinched. The fat man’s head disappeared in a cloud of blood and tissue.
The girl lowered a musket and began to reload. Koch screamed over and over as he pummeled the man who’d shot Porter. The man’s head lolled from side to side with every blow. Koch clutched him by the neck and hit him repeatedly. Tears ran down Koch’s face.
Mason stepped over. “Koch!”
Raging blue eyes turned to Mason and softened. He let go of the bloodied man’s neck. The German collapsed to the floor like a sack of rice. The big man huffed and puffed, finally putting his hands on his knees. As Mason watched, Koch knelt by the man and pressed bare fingers to the wounded man’s neck.
“Anything?” Mason asked.
Koch shook his head. Stratton stepped in and clapped the sophomore on the back. “Hell, yeah! You put that motherfucker down!”
Koch did not smile. Instead he looked down at the man and his own bloody hands. He was extraordinarily strong but not given to brutality, and was obviously shaken by the lethal results of his fury.
Stratton stepped around to the girl. “Are you all right?”
She did not look up. Instead she rammed a ball into the barrel of her musket and pounded it down. “Is my father dead?”
Her accent caught Mason’s attention. He turned to the man lying across from Porter. The man moaned and stirred. “No, he’s not.”
Porter. Mason stepped back toward the senior. Porter’s face was gray and his breathing erratic. On the left chest of Porter’s load-bearing vest was the personal first aid pouch. Mason ripped it open and withdrew the plastic-wrapped field dressing. Tearing it open with his teeth, Mason withdrew the green-and-white bandage. The white dressing was designed to absorb and expand to hold twice its weight in fluids. On either side of the dressing were twenty-four-inch woven green straps that tied to secure the dressing in place. Mason unzipped Porter’s ACU top and gently pulled the sand-colored undershirt away from the gaping wound. He pressed the dressing onto the wound and leaned down.
“You’re gonna be—” Hands shoved Mason roughly to the floor. The first man scrambled past Mason and rummaged the long table before he darted out the door. As the door swung shut, Mason saw Kennedy’s rifle in the man’s hands. “Stratton! He’s got the rifle!”
“I got him,” Stratton said and moved toward the door. “Come on, Murphy!”
They opened the door and Mason heard the tinkling of glass breaking. He looked in that direction and saw the young woman extend the barrel of the musket through one of the small rectangular panes. She took a breath, held it and let it out slowly.
Through the open door, Mason watched the man sprint down the wide lane in the gathering darkness. Against the dark trees, the man’s white-stocking-clad legs flashed. He took off his green jacket and slung it to the ground. The fallen snow would camouflage him if he got much farther. Mason looked back at the girl just as she pulled the trigger. The deafening noise slammed into Mason’s ears and a thick cloud of smoke filled the cabin’s kitchen in an instant. Mason stepped forward to the window next to the young woman and pressed his nose to the glass.
In the distance, a good hundred yards away, the man stumbled and fell into the snow. After a moment, he scrambled to his feet and Mason could see a spreading stain across his back. The man stumbled and picked up the rifle before stepping into the forest.
“Nice shot,” Mason said. The girl paid no attention to him. She was already loading another round.
Outside, Stratton and Murphy were running into the darkness. They’d be out of control in a matter of seconds. Mason looked at Porter and then at Koch still kneeling over the dead man. The rest of the squad were still out in the snow with Kennedy’s body.
Mason moved around the kitchen table and raced to the cabin’s door. “Stratton! Stop!”
The two cadets skidded to a stop a hundred yards or so away. Stratton spun angrily. “We need to get that rifle!”
“Go back and get Higgs and the others. Bring Kennedy’s body here before it gets dark,” Mason shouted. He stepped out into the cold and began to close the distance. Stratton did not move. “Come on. We need to get the squad back together and figure out what’s going on.”
“What about that rifle?”
“We have the serial number and can report it missing. The cadre will notify the local authorities. Right now, we have one dead, two injured, and half our folks are out there in the snow. Go bring them back. Take Koch with you.”
Stratton’s nose flared for a moment as if he was about to argue; instead, he started walking toward Mason. As they passed, he said, “Just how lost did you get us, Mason? Come on, Koch. Let’s go get the others.”
Mason watched Stratton and Koch break in a slow jog in the direction of where Higgs and the others waited. The setting sun turned the western sky to a bright gold through the clouds. Sunset was maybe thirty minutes away. As Murphy approached, Mason pulled out his own cell phone. No service.
“You’re not going to get a signal, Mason,” Murphy said. He swung his rifle strap over his good shoulder.
Mason shook his head. “Must be some kind of dead zone.”
Murphy glanced at him for a long moment. “There’s something you should see.”
“Where? In the museum?”
Murphy squinted and shook his head. “In the house. Those people’s home.”
“That’s not a home,” Mason said with a chuckle. Murphy grew up in New York City. Unless he had a side of the family like Mason’s, who were dirt poor and living in squalor in the sticks of Mississippi, he had no idea about backwoods life. “I’ve seen too many historical places, you know, living farms and that kind of thing. Same thing here. Some kind of museum just off post, I guess. We can use their phone to get the MPs out here.”
They walked silently, Murphy dabbing a hand at his wounded arm twice and checking for blood. Mason said nothing and the silence felt like a vice around his head. The cadre would be coming through the woods behind the cabin any moment. A cadet was dead, a rifle had disappeared, and any chance he had of earning his lieutenant’s bars vanished. Why do we even do this field bullshit? The guys who want to go in combat arms should do it, but not somebody who planned to be a lawyer. The day when soldiers turned to the wannabe lawyers for tactical expertise was right up there with hell freezing over.
The brownish-red door opened. The costumed girl looked them over and locked eyes with Murphy. “Did you get the Hessian?”
Hessian? Mason spoke, “No. I told the others to get the rest of our people and bring them here. We’ll call for help and figure out what happened.”
“Help? From whom? Washington?”
Mason shook his head. “No. Our leaders. They’ll know what to do.”
“Your leaders?” She folded her arms across the white apron front of her dress. “And just who are your leaders? And what is that emblem on your shoulder?”
Mason looked at his right shoulder, the one typically reserved for combat action unit patches. Cadets wore the emblem of their university. “My school.”
“The flag,” the girl said, again looking at Murphy.
“Yeah? It’s an American flag.”
“Not our flag,” the girl said. She stepped down onto the moist ground and walked up to Murphy. “You mind telling me just who you are?”
Murphy nodded at the open door. “We should check on your husband.”
The girl scowled at him. “He’s my father, not my husband.” She turned toward the door. “How many others are with you?”
Mason started to speak but Murphy grabbed his elbow. “There are nine of us total. One of our men is dead in the forest back there.”
“Bastards. They are worse than the Sassenach.” She spat and shook her head.
Mason squinted at Murphy, who shrugged his shoulders. “What’s a Sassenach?”
The girl gaped at him. “His Majesty’s army? The bloody redcoats. Who did you think I was talking about?”
Mason didn’t know what to say. Murphy spoke for him. “It’s a long story, miss.”
The girl looked over their shoulders, scanning the wood line and surrounding forest. “Get inside. There may be more of them.”
They stepped into the cabin. The foyer they’d burst through was tiny by comparison to the rest of the home. A large fireplace with multiple hearths dominated the center of the structure and poured heat and light into the dim spaces. The girl moved to her father as he rolled to his back and started to sit up. The head wound was nasty, likely concussive, but he’d be okay. They’d managed to save both of them at a terrible cost.
Mason knelt next to Porter. The senior barely breathed and his pulse was weak. Mason slid his hand up to Porter’s shoulder and squeezed gently. “Help is on the way, man. Just hang in there.”
Porter did not respond.
Chin on his chest, Mason closed his eyes intending to pray. Instead, his failures over the past several hours played back like a horror movie. In his worst nightmares, he could not have imagined any of this. He would be drummed out of ROTC within a week. Having already signed a contract for entry into the services, he could expect basic training and years of being a lower enlisted soldier instead of law school and an automatic promotion to captain. All of it because he couldn’t find a simple tactical objective. It was stupid and frustrating. Not every person in the army had to carry a rifle. The army needed lawyers, too.
“Mason?” Murphy asked. He knelt next to the man with the bloodied head. “How’s Porter?”
There wasn’t an answer that he wanted to face. Blood covered the senior’s torso and waist areas. A fresh pool spread across the rough-hewn flooring. The shoddy craftsmanship distracted Mason’s thoughts for a moment. These strange, savage people had gone to extremes to make this museum-home authentic. Shaking the errant thoughts away, he leaned down to Porter’s ear.
“Hang on, Porter. Help is on the way.” He grasped the senior’s left hand, gazed at the bloodied wedding ring, and froze. Like most of the cadets, he’d been there when Porter proposed to Janet at Three Rivers Stadium during the World Series. They’d provided the color guard for the pregame ceremonies and then spent Game One in the Pirates owner’s box. Fourteen months married, with a little boy named David.
God, what do I tell her?
He looked at his watch and frowned. Stratton should be back with Higgs soon. Maybe there was something she could do with Porter’s wound until the cadre evacuated them. The senior’s eyes were open now and frantically looking around.
“Janet?” he choked out. “Janet?”
Mason leaned closer. “She’s coming, Porter. Hang on.”
Porter turned his head slowly and looked at Mason for a long moment. “All this.”
“What?”
Porter swallowed and coughed. Mason felt moisture hit the side of his face as he leaned in closer. “All this.”
Mason looked at Porter’s face. The senior’s breathing hitched and he struggled to get the words out.
“Grantville.” Porter’s eyes closed and his head thumped against the rough floor boards. After ten agonizing seconds, he took a shallow breath and then another.
“Let me look at your arm,” a new voice said. Mason spun to see the bloodied man sitting up at the long table with his hands untying the field dressing.
“Don’t undo that,” Mason said.
The man glared at him. “I do what I want, boy.”
Mason stood up. “Boy?”
Murphy looked at him. “Mason? You need to see something.”
The bloodied man turned back to Murphy and untied the dressing. “As long as it missed the bone, you’ll be fine.”
“I said, don’t untie that dressing.” Mason stepped toward them. Murphy stood up and put his good arm between them. “Get out of the way, Murphy. No one talks to me like that.”
Murphy turned toward the table and picked up a floppy book. “Look at this, Mason.” The rough-edged booklet with stylized writing had a familiar title. “This is what I was talking about.”
“Common Sense. Yeah, I’ve read it.” Mason shook his head. “I don’t need a history lesson, man. This muse shit ain’t going to help Porter and Kennedy.”
“This is a brand-new copy, Mason. At least it looks like the one from the museum I remember, except it’s almost new.”
Mason sighed and stood. “So what if it’s brand-new, Murphy?”
Murphy squinted but did not say anything. “Sir?”
The bloodied man dabbed at his wound with a disgusted look on his face. “Yes?”
“Would you mind telling my friend today’s date?”
The man shook his head. “December the twenty-first.”
Mason glanced at Murphy. “It’s November—”
“The year?” Murphy asked. “What year is it?”
The girl frowned. “Seventeen seventy-six, of course. What is wrong with the two of you?”
Grantville. Hadn’t Porter whispered that? Oh, no.
A knock at the door stopped them. Mason stepped to the door and heard Stratton whisper, “Let us in.”
“Sir, may our friends come in?”
The man looked up and stared at Murphy’s right shoulder and the American flag. “Your friends? Are you our friends, son?”
Murphy nodded. “We’ll explain. We have some medical supplies that might help our friend and dress your wound.”
The man nodded. “My name is Daniels. Vernon Daniels. This is my daughter, Emily. You’re wearing a flag like ours.”
Mason nodded. “It is.”
“More stars,” the man said. He stood and half staggered to one of the Hessian bodies. He began stripping the man’s clothes away. “Help me with the other one. We have to get them out of here.”
Mason looked at Murphy. “Grantville. That’s what Porter said.”
Murphy nodded. “I had a cousin there, Mason. That’s what I was trying to tell you.”
“What are we going to tell the others?”
Murphy shrugged. “What’s to tell?”
Mason nodded. “We don’t know what happened.”
“But we’re sure of where we are.” They stripped the fat Hessian’s body and piled the clothes and belongings near the fireplace. “We’re southeast of Trenton in the days before—”
“Northwest,” Daniels said. “We’re northwest of Trenton.”
Murphy shook his head and nodded. “Right. That’s what I meant.” He looked up at Mason for a long moment, and Mason understood. If it was December 1776, they were on the wrong side of the Delaware River. Washington would attack on Christmas Day. The attack would change the entire scope of the war. Mason’s stomach turned. They’d lost a modern assault rifle in the midst of a war. And the wrong side had it.
“We have to get that rifle.”
Murphy shrugged. “It’s dark and we don’t have a good grasp of the terrain. We can search him out in the morning. He’s wounded. We can track him.”
Mason laughed. “You a hunter, Murphy?”
“Eagle Scout. I can do almost anything.”
Daniels spoke. “Are you a freedman? Is that why you’re listening to him?”
Murphy looked at Mason but said nothing. Mason met the man’s eyes. “I’m not a freedman, Mister Daniels. I’m from Pennsylvania.”
“Why did they listen to you?”
Mason took a breath. “They are my squad. I’m the squad leader.”
“Squad?” Daniels shook his head. “Where are you from? Are you with the rebels or the Sassenach?”
“The what?” Mason asked.
Daniels frowned deeper. “The British, boy! Are you with them?”
“No. We’re Americans.”
“Where are you from? Who sent you?”
Mason took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. He reached into his front left pocket and pulled out a group of coins. He looked at the quarter and smiled. He flipped it to its unique rear side and handed it to Daniels.
“That’s where we are from.”
Daniels studied the coin and looked up. “Bicentennial? America is two hundred years old where you are from?”
Murphy smiled. “More than that.”
Daniels handed the quarter back to them. “We’ll discuss this later. Help me get these bodies out of here or the Hessians will come and burn this all to the ground.”
“There’s another body out in the big clearing behind the house,” Murphy said. “One of our friends.”
Daniels nodded. “We’ll take them into the woods to the east, down toward the Princeton Road. There’s a hole that the Hessians won’t think to check until spring. Emily, you get the mess here cleaned up.”
“Yes, Father.” The girl’s wide brown eyes were steady.
Murphy piped in. “Our folks will help.”
“How many of you are there?” Daniels asked. The scowl on his face darkened.
Mason did the math. “There will be eight of us now, sir.”
Daniels nodded and for the first time looked at Mason’s weapon. “May I see that?”
As he handed the rifle over, Mason looked at the far wall. Several muskets and implements caught his eye. “This is an M16 rifle. All we have is blank ammunition.”
“How do you load it?”
Mason twisted the rifle in Daniels’ hands and pushed the magazine ejection button. The slim, metal rectangle slid easily out of the rifle. The crimped brass rounds gleamed in the firelight. Mason waited for some incredulous outburst, watching Daniels’ face for shock, but there was nothing for almost two full minutes as the man picked up and twirled a brass cartridge in his fingers.
“Noisemakers?” Daniels chuckled. “What kind of soldiers are you?”
Murphy said, “Cadets. Officers in training.”
Daniels ran his hands over the rifle from butt to muzzle. “You know how to work this? With real ammunition?”
“Yes,” Mason said. “We do.”
“I’ve never seen anything like this. They are exactly the same? All of its parts?”
“Yes,” Mason said. When did the concept of interchangeable parts start? He couldn’t remember. Instead, he thought of one of the old Star Trek movies where the crew convinced a modern-day metallurgist to make transparent aluminum.
Daniels handed the rifle back. “I’ll see about that ammunition later.”
“You can make it work?”
“I’m a weaponsmith.” He smiled for the first time. Daniels took a breath and shifted in his chair. “I can make any musket or long rifle better. But, you’re going to have to tell me the God’s honest truth, boy. Who are you and where are you from?”
* * *
On the Princeton Road, a mile northeast of Trenton, three men in green jackets and plumed hats stamped their feet against the cold. The patrol’s leader tugged at the long mustache hair along the corners of his mouth and frowned.
“Late again.” His voice was a low growl. “Wonder where Essen found a bottle this time?”
The others blew into their hands and said nothing. For weeks, their commanders had given them free rein over the countryside. Anything they found was theirs. Food. Drink. Women. Children, even. They’d all taken whatever fancied them. Filling their pockets and emptying their balls often occurred at the same places. Amongst the dumb colonists, nothing mattered. The only thing good about them was their propensity for strong drink.
“We should join them,” one of the young Hessians said. A few others huffed their agreement as they hunched against the cold.
“Did you hear the shot?” asked another jaeger. “Maybe they found something to eat?”
“Wrong direction,” the leader said. He turned and looked to the west where the single shot had resonated from a few moments before. He thought about investigation, walking farther away from Trenton to find a drunkard and his patrol.
“What if they were captured?”
“Not our problem.”
“Quiet,” the leader said, but the cold air seeping through his boots made the want of a fire and a drink too strong. “Let’s go. Essen and his idiots can stay out here all night for what I care.”
They turned as a group, slung their muskets over their shoulders, and hiked back toward Trenton. Heads down, hands stuffed under the jackets for warmth, they moved silently toward comfort oblivious to a wounded man scrambling for help in the distant wood line.