By the time the wagon reached the via Aurelia and turned right along it, Ramage could distinguish the features of the guard and Martin and Paolo.
"It's cold," the boy said, "but at least the mosquitoes haven't woken up."
"Yet," Martin said, "and we're still alive. I've even got my flute, but the damned thing has slipped down so the ropes are trying to shove it through my ribs."
"Is everything else all right under your shirt?" Ramage recalled the sailmaker making the waistcoat with the vertical pockets, and cursed himself for not insisting on flaps being added which could be buttoned down.
"Yes, sir. I'm sorry about. . ."
"It wasn't your fault. Never trust inn tables."
A sudden noise like a bull being strangled startled them, and a few moments later a peasant jogged past on his braying donkey, sitting astride the animal with his feet nearly touching the ground. The trees recently planted at even spaces along each side of the road to provide shade for marching troops were growing well and proving useful for the landless owners of livestock: several dozen goats had been tethered to various trees and, as was always the way with goats, most of them had gone round and round until their ropes were wound up so short that they could hardly move. As it grew lighter the guard opened the door of the lantern and blew out the candle, and the smell of the smouldering wick caught the backs of their throats.
A pair of oxen pulling a wide-wheeled cart passed going the other way and Ramage saw how each animal leaned inwards, towards the single pole between them that acted as the shaft. It was said that from the time an animal first pulled a cart and was put, say, in the right-hand position it always had to be on that side because it became used to working with an inward list. The useless information one acquires, Ramage thought sourly just as the wagon swung round to the right, rattling and bumping as it left the via Aurelia and started down the track leading to the Pineta di Feniglia, the southern causeway which ended in Argentario just short of Porto Ercole.
Looking eastward, Ramage could see that the first rays of the sun, which was still below the eastern horizon, were just catching the top of Monte Amiata and, a few minutes later, Monte Labbro, lower and nearer. There was very little cloud; it was, as Martin remarked with irritating cheerfulness, going to be a scorching day.
The track dipped downhill for a few hundred yards and as the wheels went silent Ramage knew they had reached the sand. There was an occasional shudder as a wheel hit an old tree stump. Then, as the upper tip of the sun lifted above the distant mountains and a ray shone into the wagon, Ramage glanced across at the soldier sitting among the kitbags and guarding the three Britons. He had leaned back and slipped slightly so that he was cradled between the bags; his mouth was open, his unshaven face greasy with perspiration, and he was quite clearly sound asleep. Ramage was not sure when the man had dropped off, but had been expecting him to forbid them to talk. Then he remembered that the man had been both clumsy and silent when the prisoners were hoisted on board: he was still partly drunk from the night before.
The horse ambled on; there was no cracking of the whip or cursing, and it was obvious that the driver was in no hurry to arrive at Porto Ercole: being a good soldier he knew that it was better to travel than arrive: the arrival of the baggage wagon only meant that the baggage had to be unloaded, and although he might not have to hoist out crates or toss down kitbags, he would have to rub down the horse and feed and water it, and, judging by the squeaking, put some tallow on the axletrees.
Ramage thought it curious that the man in point had cracked that whip amid a shower of curses every fifty yards or so along the via Aurelia, and for the first few hundred yards along this track. Now, as they reached the sand, he had stopped. Perhaps he too had dropped off to sleep.
Jackson's head suddenly appeared above the tailboard, the sandy hair soaked with perspiration. The American was holding a cocked pistol.
"Morning, sir, where's your guard?" he asked quietly, loping along to keep up with the cart.
A dumbfounded Ramage nodded with his head towards the sleeping man and a few moments later Jackson vaulted over the tailboard into the wagon, reaching across the kitbags and gently removed a pistol from the Frenchman's hand without waking him. He gave a sniff and showed Ramage the empty wine flask that had been in the guard's other hand.
"You must find that chair uncomfortable, sir," Jackson said conversationally as he took out a long-bladed knife and began cutting the rope.
"A little," Ramage said. "We're glad to see you: we've all been sitting like this for the last six or seven hours."
As the last piece of rope dropped free and he tried to stand up, Ramage felt as though every bone in his body had been hammered with a caulker's maul and every sinew overstretched by an inch. It must have felt like this when the Inquisition unwound the rack to give the heretic a chance to confess.
Ramage sat down on the chair again, afraid he would topple over, and tentatively wriggled his left arm. He moved it up and down until the worst of the pain had stopped and then tried the right arm. Then he moved his left ankle in a circular movement and gently bent down to massage his shin. Finally he was able to stand up without too much pain as Paolo copied him and Jackson cut through the last of Martin's bonds. The three men thanked him through their groans.
"Sorry we weren't here sooner, sir," Jackson said apologetically as he slipped his knife back into its sheath on his belt. "We came as soon as we heard."
"Where's Rossi, then?"
"Driving the horse with one hand and propping up the driver with the other - he's asleep too. Horse seems to know the way, which is just as well, 'cos Rossi's better with a tiller than reins."
"But how the devil did you know that -"
"That innkeeper in Orbetello, sir. He saw what happened - accidentally caused it, so he said - and guessed you were British. He and his brother belong to a sort of partisan group that fights the French when it gets the chance. Anyway, his brother owns the cantina in Porto Ercole. Rossi had already made friends with him, so that when the other brother sent word from Orbetello, we were warned. His son, a young lad of eight or nine, paddled across the lagoon with a duck punt and then ran the rest of the way. We knew the troops were due to arrive in Porto Ercole today to board the frigates, and this is the only way from Orbetello, along the Feniglia, so we waited here as a sort of ambush, because we guessed they'd have to use a cart to move you."
"But just two of you - supposing the French had sent a platoon to guard us?"
Jackson grinned and pointed forward along the track. "There's twenty or so of the cantina fellow's cronies waiting up there, where the pine trees come in very close to the track, like the neck of a funnel. They're armed with a weird collection of weapons - muskets that must have been intended for the Armada, billhooks, scythes, a butcher has the big knife he uses to cut up oxen . . . They're all waiting. Rossi'll give them a wave in time, so they'll know everything's all right. Now, if you'll excuse me, sir, I think we'd better wake the driver and stow him in here with his mate. We can use these scraps of rope to tie them up."
Ramage held up a hand. "Wait a moment. If the French find our guards tied up, they'll know we were rescued, which means they'll start searching for the partisans and probably taking hostages. Innocent people will get shot in reprisal. We must make it look as though we escaped on our own." He thought quickly for a few moments. "Here," he said to Jackson, "take Martin and lodge the driver so that he stays asleep without falling off the cart. Don't wake him up. Paolo! Put that pistol back in the hand of that guard, but be careful with it."