Sam turned his attention to the strip of land between the river and the rock face, along which the barbarians would come. It was nothing more than a grassy bank now buried beneath five or six inches of snow. Here and there were deeper drifts that threatened to bog down an unwary driver. At the top of the cliff Sam could see the edge of the forest. From here, with its dark, leafless branches, it looked like a heavy black fringe of hair running along the cliff. Half a dozen crows circled high above the trees themselves, their mournful cries filling the air.
Just at that moment Sam could picture the Bluebeards’ surprise at seeing the approach of this motley bunch of vehicles.
Somehow he couldn’t believe their reaction would be one of fear.
They were more likely to burst out laughing.
Along the track that led to the main road came the cavalrymen with their long steel-tipped lances held vertical. Behind them came horse-drawn carts that carried the foot soldiers, together with barrels of wood alcohol that would serve as a Victorian equivalent of napalm.
‘Ah, good.’ Carswell walked briskly up to Sam. He was dressed in a long tweed coat and riding boots. ‘You’re ready with the Range Rover?’
‘All the rockets are in the tubes, ready to fire.’
‘You will remember that the light-bulb triggers will work only once, then the whole trigger assembly has to be replaced when you come back to reload?’
Sam nodded. ‘We’re ready to go when the Bluebeards show themselves.’
‘Good man. Ah, here are the foot soldiers. Now, I don’t intend to deploy these fellows in the battle unless I have to. They’re our insurance if Johnny Bluebeard should happen to break through.’
Sam saw Jud catch his eye. Carswell’s plan sounded so slick. As if nothing could go wrong. But Sam remembered clearly enough his first demonstration of the electric rocket trigger he’d devised. It hadn’t fired.
Nevertheless, they’d all agreed to put their lives in Carswell’s hands. His plan seemed plausible; certainly it was the only one with any chance of success. Love it or hate it, they were stuck with the thing now.
Carswell pulled on his leather gloves. ‘I’ll see about having fires lit. This cold’s going to be a devil of a problem if we have to wait long. At least it’s no longer snowing to speak of.’
He walked away to where the soldiers were unloading their equipment from the carts.
‘Well,’ Sam said with a grim smile. ‘December 25th. Merry Christmas, Jud.’
‘And a Merry Christmas to you, Mr Baker.’ Jud’s smile failed on his face. He looked a worried man. ‘Maybe we should have fortified some of the buildings in town after all; just in case…’
‘Don’t you think these vehicles are going to do the job?’
‘On paper they should.’
‘So Carswell was fond of repeating. But we’re not fighting this battle on paper. It will be on 50 acres of snow and ice.’
‘You know, Sam, if the Bluebeards do attack and it goes badly for us, there might come a time when we have decide it’s every man for himself.’
‘Don’t let Carswell hear you say that. He’ll accuse you of defeatism.’
‘That he might. But the bottom line is, we might have to concentrate on saving our own skins and the skins of individuals who are closest to us.’
Sam looked at him. ‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’
‘Too bloody right I am. If Carswell’s Operation Rolling Vengeance goes up Shit Creek I’m going to get Dot and myself away from here on the river.’ He nodded to his boat, moored down by the jetty. ‘You, Zita, Lee and Ryan are welcome to join us.’
Sam nodded, thinking hard about Jud’s offer. For a lucky few a boat would be a means of escape. But what about the rest?
Jud glanced across the car park. ‘Rolle’s arrived with the Reverend Hather. Maybe that means we’ll have God on our side.’
After speaking to Rolle, Carswell walked briskly across the car park towards Jud and Sam. He shouted something to the commanding officer of the lancers. Sam didn’t catch the words. Maybe it was something about lighting fires to warm themselves as they waited.
Carswell walked up; a high red colour had flushed through his cheeks. The tremor had started again under his left eyebrow.
He spoke just two words.
‘They’re here.’
For a moment Sam thought the man was referring to the soldiers. Then, with a pricking of those two extra fingers that served as his thumbs, the penny dropped. They’re here.
He twisted to look back along the river where the strip of ground ran between water and rock face.
They’re here.
Like a solid wall of darkness he saw the figures. There was no flash of light, no pyrotechnics, no fuss, as the Bluebeards came through the time-gate. They were just there.
And they were marching this way. Thousands upon thousands of them. This was the beginning of the end.
Carswell took his position in the visitors’ centre that now served as the battlefield command post.
Sam watched Zita join Lee Burton on the bus as the soldiers clambered on board to assume their positions at the four artillery pieces: the big gun barrels jutted out from the sides of the bus where the windows had been.
Everywhere else there was a buzz of activity as people readied themselves.
‘D-Day,’ Jud said as he climbed into the passenger seat of the Range Rover.
Sam nodded. He opened the door, taking care not to knock his head on the ‘wings’ that held the rocket launchers out at either side of the car. The thing quirkily resembled a helicopter gunship without the rotors.
He belted himself into the driving seat, then turned the key in the ignition. Into the seat behind him climbed two apprentice infantrymen. Although they’d been deliberately ‘exposed’ to 20th Century technology, even taken for a short ride in the cars to acclimatise them, they still looked round the interior with a mixture of astonishment and suspicion.
Sam glanced back as they sat with their rifles upright between their feet. ‘Everyone ready?’
They nodded, their round eyes still scanning the interior of the car.
‘You okay, Jud?’
‘Yes, touch wood.’ He tapped a finger on the short section of plank that had been fixed to the dashboard in front of him.
Nailed to that were eight switches, rudimentary things made from strips of metal cut from food cans. When a metal strip was pressed, the circuit was completed and a jolt of electricity would run from the car battery to the rockets set in the wings.
Carswell appeared at the doorway of the visitor’s centre and made a windmilling motion with one arm. ‘He’s waving us out… Damn.’
‘Sam, what’s wrong?’
‘Back in a minute.’ Sam opened his door. ‘One of the wires has come adrift from the rocket tube.’
‘Leave it.’
‘It won’t fire unless it’s connected. It won’t take long.’
Fixing the wire back to the light-bulb terminal took only a moment, but then Sam spotted something else.
‘Jud, there’s something wrong with the van. They’re not moving.’
Sam ran across the car park, his feet making a soft padding sound on the snow. ‘Why aren’t you moving out?’ he called to the man driving the ice-cream van.
‘It won’t start… the battery’s flat.’
God Almighty. Carswell’s perfect Operation Rolling Vengeance was showing cracks already.
‘Pop the hood,’ Sam called. ‘I’ll bring up the Range Rover and we’ll jump-start her.’