1635 The Cannon Law: Chapter Thirty Three

Rome

    The evacuation was rapidly turning into a small slice of hell for Sharon. It was beginning to look like just loading the carriages yesterday and getting while the getting was good would have been the best plan.

    Right now, there was a small crowd of would-be evacuees catching a few hours sleep, wrapped in blankets in the embassy ballroom. The carriages and the three carts that the marines had managed to acquire—Sharon decided she really didn't need to know where or how, although they had spent money to get them—were standing idle. The plans to retain remounts for their cavalrymen had pretty much gone up in smoke. There was a pack made up for every horse that was not carrying an armed man. It would take more than a couple of hours to get everything moving again after Sharon had decided, shortly after midnight, that everyone that could should get some rest before they moved out.

    This, on top of learning that Frank had decided to stay, and more than likely make some kind of Heroic Last Stand. Ruy had ventured the opinion that if Frank felt his honor and duty called him to it, it would be wrong to argue with him about it. Late last night, when word came back, Sharon had been in no mood or condition to debate the point. Frank might have decided on the life of a subversive, and good luck to him, but Sharon was keenly aware that Stoner, his dad, and Magda, his step mom, were two of her best friends in the world. The last thing Sharon wanted to have to do was send a "deeply regret" letter to either of them. Worse, have to explain to them that he'd stayed in a city about to be invaded because she'd not personally gone down there and dragged him and his wife out.

    It had been the first fight she and Ruy had had as a married couple. The mayhem that was the embassy had gotten on her nerves, she'd been tired, she was royally pissed off that this had had to happen on her fucking wedding day and she'd given Ruy both barrels. He'd been visibly hurt, and she'd regretted it instantly. The thing was, she wasn't sure how to go about making it up. She'd apologized, explained that she was stressed over the evacuation and upset by Frank's decision and what it might cost her, and Ruy had been all care and consideration after that.

    With a reservation. "Sharon, my heart," he'd said, "I, too, am saddened that Frank may not survive these next few days. But I will not regret—not for one instant— that he has chosen to fulfill the demands of his honor. Without such as he, this new world whose birth you seek to bring about will never come to be."

    Hate it though she did, she knew he was right. "Go in the morning," she'd said, "and if he still thinks he can hold on there, at least see if he'll evacuate the women and kids with us. Pregnant women in particular."

    And so Ruy was away in the first few moments of quiet that Sharon had had since walking out of the church yesterday. Right when Sharon needed a strong arm to lean on—

    "I'd ask if you were okay, honey," came her father's voice from behind her, "but right now I think that would be the dumbest possible question I could ask."

    She felt her mouth twitch a little. She almost, but didn't quite, have the energy to smile at the little joke. "I can't escape the feeling that we're all screwed anyway," she said.

    "Evacuations are always bad. I was already back home and in college when Saigon fell, but I saw plenty of refugees trying to get out. You saw what they looked like when they got to Grantville, back in the early days—"

    "Hell."

    "Like hell, yes. Think about what it takes to get people in that kind of condition. Unless we're good and lucky, that's what we're about to go through." Her dad's voice didn't have any of its accustomed warm humor. If anything, it sounded like the tone he had in the operating room, doing trauma work. Describing the injuries in detail to his support team, so they would know what to expect from the coming work. A tone of voice for describing flesh torn, bones broken, and blood leaking away. Or, for the optimistic, a voice enumerating the things that had to be done to save another life. Businesslike or dispassionate, take your pick.

    It was a callousness Sharon hadn't yet acquired. She knew her own operating manner was a lot more involved. Which was showing in the way she was handling this godawful mess.

    Her dad put his arms around her. "You'll be okay, princess. You're doing fine. Better at this kind of thing than pretty much anyone I know. So long as we start before they get here, we'll be okay. You heard the report, no cavalry worth talking about. So long as we move quicker than guys who keep stopping to loot, we'll be fine. Other than that, it's bandits, and between the Marines and everyone else here who's got a gun, those are going to be some mighty sorry bandits if they try anything."

    Sharon chuckled. "Daddy's going to keep me safe," she said, in a little girl's sing song voice.

    "Heh. Daddy's going to kick back and let that fiery young Catalan feller do all the hard work."

    "Young?" Sharon turned and smiled at him.

    "Young. Man's at least two years younger'n I am—maybe even as much as five—and has the attitudes of a teenager to boot. Not like my own august and reserved demeanor, at all." He puffed up his chest and thumbed a lapel.

    "Hooey," came Melissa's voice. Sharon was starting to think of the former schoolteacher as her stepmother, in a way she'd never really expected to. She and Melissa had become friends before she'd moved in with her dad, and she’d thought the relationship would stay stayed on that basis. She'd thoroughly approved of her getting together with her father, of course. Mom had been mom, and couldn't ever be replaced, but it was just plain right that dad should be happy again. That it was her friend Melissa, her best friend's old history teacher, was just a happy bonus.

    "Really? My dad's claim to be respectable is all just a front?" Sharon caught the ball and ran with it, "Who'd a' thunk it?"

    "Really. I woke this morning to the sight of him cleaning his pistol. And him a doctor as well."

    "Nothing wrong with drumming up a little trade in a righteous cause," he protested.

    "Leave it to the young men, you aging juvenile," Melissa said. "They've got the energy for it."

    "Oh, I've not got the energy, have I? That wasn't what you said—"

    "Dad!" Adult or not, there were some things Sharon really didn't need to know about. Not, at least, in any detail.

    Melissa's heavenward roll of the eyes was all the agreement anyone could want from that quarter. "Are things getting moving yet?" she asked.

    "Soon." Sharon hadn't been the only one to remain awake all night. Adolf had kept watch too, and she'd found him just beginning to rouse his people to get the evacuees marshaled. "We'll be a couple of hours after dawn, I think. We have to get the horses loaded up again, breakfast for everyone, and then hit the road. Normally, that’s an hour, tops, but here…"

    "But everything becomes simple, and the simple becomes difficult," Melissa said. "As an old warmonger once observed. I think it'll be midmorning before we finally get moving, myself."

    "Still plenty of time, though," Sharon said. "The Spanish were in Ostia yesterday afternoon. They simply can't be here before noon."

    Melissa frowned. "I don't want to suggest that they're superhuman or anything, but is there any way they could be here earlier? I think Ruy was assuming that the Spanish commander would rest his troops before marching in to town. What if he doesn't?"

    "I asked him that," Doctor Nichols said. "He thinks that he's better assuming that we're up against someone with some smarts, and that he'll want his troops reasonably fresh today. Plus, if he tries to push them too hard, they'll just refuse to move. It's not quite that following orders is an optional extra for these guys, but it can look that way sometimes. I think I'll take Ruy's judgment on that one."

    "Still, perhaps we could get at least some of our people on the road quickly?" Melissa asked. "I find myself thinking that there are a lot of children coming with us, and giving them as much of a head start as we can might be…" She let the suggestion hang in the air.

    Sharon decided it was a good one. "If we can, Melissa, would you take charge of that convoy? I'll get with Captain Taggart and figure out how best to split the Marines. Having some of us staying until the last minute would be a good idea in any event. There might be people we need to get out who won't be ready to leave until we've got the Spanish breathing down our necks."

    Melissa nodded. "Adolf was in the ballroom a few minutes ago, I'll go and find him and we'll get started. Come on, James, the sooner we start—"

    Doctor Nichols was holding up his hand. "Actually, Melissa, I'll go with the second party. I'd guess that Captain Taggart is going to want to send most of his Marines with the first group, since they'll have the kids with them and move slowest. If we can, we should confine the stay-behind party to people who can handle a gun and move quickly. And if we're just ahead of the real trouble, I think we're going to need more trained medics with us. If Rita goes with you, she'll be enough medic for the advance group, and Tom can boss the Marines if the good Captain stays with us."

    Melissa chuckled. "So long as Tom doesn't get all macho and insist on staying with the rearguard."

    "No, he won’t. Unlike my daughter, who by rights should be going with the lead party, but will insist on standing her post until the last minute. I've got more sense than to persuade her otherwise."

    Sharon snorted. "Enough. Let's get things moving. It'll be dawn in a few minutes."

    They had a convoy of women and children and most of the baggage ready to go within an hour of dawn. The kids were chattering and running about the horses, in some cases still munching on the bread-and-cheese breakfast they had been given. Tom, who in truth had grumbled a little about being sent on, was on foot, having ceded his horse to two pregnant women. "I wish we could get the kids to line up and hold hands," he said, looking about.

    Melissa smiled, gently. "It's not something they learn in grade school here.  Besides, it'll do the Marines good to have kids to herd while we get outside the city. Keep 'em alert." Sharon had seen her eyes constantly flicking back and forth. The motion looked practiced, and Sharon guessed that Melissa had taken enough field trips in her time that keeping track of dozens of rambunctious youngsters at once had become second nature. Rita was in the middle of a small swarm of children—where did they all come from? We didn't have this many last night!—and was comforting a little girl who had already skinned her knee.

    Tom had stationed most of the cavalrymen at the back of the column he had formed up in the street outside the embassy, on the theory that they could watch over the kids and herd them back in to line if they strayed and their mothers didn't notice. Two of them already had kids riding up with them, which Sharon worried about a little if there was any trouble. Having to put a child down gently could slow them down. Still, the defense of the column had been bolstered by including the menfolk of the embassy staff with cudgels, knives and downtime muskets.  They were mostly on foot and would be keeping the kids in line as well. For the time being, though, their attitude seemed to be that if the kids wanted to play, let 'em.

    Tom waved it all aside. "Well, we've got what we've got. Anything else is going to have to come out with the rest of you."

    "Or be burnt," Sharon said, thinking of the large pile of brushwood, broken-up furniture, classified documents and sprinkled gunpowder that was out back of the embassy awaiting a match to send it up. They were still finding things to go on that pile even now. "Whatever happens, we're not staying past noon."

    "See you don't," Tom said, giving Sharon a few watts of his best commanding-officer glare.

    With that, he bellowed the order to move out. The kids, to Sharon's surprise, fell into reasonable order quite quickly, and she guessed they would keep up the quick walking pace for quite a while. They didn't have the automobile to make them prone to get bored with a walk of any great length.

    Sharon watched them down the street, and out of sight as they turned on to the via Calabria to leave the city by the Porta Salaria. They had a rendezvous point at a village about ten miles away, which they should reach by sundown. The ten people left behind would make better time, of course, and in theory would overtake them on the road. If they didn't, Tom and Rita would have to take their best guess as to what to do. They had the radio crew with them, at least, so they would be able to consult with Magdeburg if they truly had to.

    At least most of the people she was responsible for were out of harm's way. Adolf would be pleased that the final clear-up would be done with fifty or sixty fewer bodies underfoot. She was about to turn and go back inside and help when Ruy appeared, trotting his horse around the corner and coming back to the front door.

    "Is he coming with us?" Sharon asked, as he dismounted to lead his horse through the arch to the stable.

    Ruy sighed. "No, Sharon, he is not. He was not offended that I asked."

    "Do you think he'll make it?"

    "In truth? With only moderate good fortune, Sharon. He has disguised his tavern to appear derelict, and proposes to hide as many as he may on the upper floors. He has created rear entrances, the women are on upper floors and have pulled the ladders up after them, and I could see nothing left undone in the matter of defenses. Should there be a general sack, he may well escape entirely. In that sense, he is at less risk than we who are evacuating."

    "Really?" Sharon felt at least a little relief. If Frank was hiding, that was only a little worse than if he was running. And, surely, looters would not bother with a poor neighborhood. The Spanish ones won't, at least. And Frank should be able to handle local hooligans. Has before, at any rate.

    She sighed, deeply. "Ruy, I should apologize for my remarks last night. I'm afraid for Frank and Giovanna, truly I am, but I shouldn't have let that make me mad at you."

    Ruy didn't trouble to answer that, but simply took hold of her and hugged her, hard, not troubling with who might be watching. Verbose he might be, but when words wouldn't do it, he could say just as much without opening his mouth.

    Two hours later, she gathered everyone around her. "Well," she said, "We're ready. Can anyone think of a good reason to wait for—"She was interrupted by the sound of pealing bells, one that rapidly multiplied.

    "Early," her dad remarked.

    "It may be that a fast horse was posted along the likely approach," Ruy added. "But your assumption is the prudent one. Sharon, we should leave now. We will have something between a half hour and two hours to be clear of the city."

    "Let's do it, then," Sharon said. "Are all the horses ready?"

    Captain Taggart nodded. "Aye, that they are, mistress."

    "Then there's no reason to wait. No, wait. Someone light the fire. We'll wait to be sure it's going good and hot."

    Half an hour later, they were at the Porta Salaria themselves. The structure hardly merited the name it had; the walls on either side were long since derelict and, being nothing more than mediaeval curtain walls, were not likely to stop a determined attacker for more than perhaps half an hour. Even if Rome had had the troops to man them.

    As it was, the gate was simply an arch, in poor repair, with no actual gate in the arch. Off to one side, scaffolding where the modernization work was in its early stages had been left up, so that even if a defense had been mounted, there was a clear route over the wall for soldiers prepared to exert themselves only slightly more than if they had marched through the gate. Sharon had played tourist in her first few weeks, and knew that pretty much every other way into the city was in a similar condition. The gates were customs posts, not serious defensive works.

    She looked back. The column of smoke from the fire at the embassy was barely visible. The fire had been burning hot, with little smoke, when they had left, having flared up well. What smoke existed was simply part of the general smudge that covered any city in this day and age. Barely noticeable, in other words. Lighter than usual today, in fact, since so many people had gotten out of town, even if only to sleep rough in the countryside for a few days. And then she saw, to the south, a column of thicker, darker smoke starting to rise, and heard the distant crackle of muskets, volley firing. And the deeper boom of cannon-fire.

    "It begins," Ruy said, shading his eyes and peering southward for more clues as to what action was taking place. "It may be that some horse were able to ride ahead of the main body of foot."

    "I'm still worried about Frank," she said.

    "I will make one final visit, so at least we can be sure that the invaders are truly bypassing Frank's Taverna."

    "That's not safe, surely," Sharon said, realizing as the words came out that that was precisely the wrong way to persuade Ruy against anything.

    He chuckled. "It is actually perfectly safe," he answered. "A Spaniard, in a city invaded by Spaniards? I can order soldiers not to attack me. Indeed, I can ask what their orders are."

    Crazy, but it would work. "Make sure you don't get recognized," she said.

    "It would be to my advantage if I was recognized," he countered. "I may well have old friends among that army, who will greet me as such and tell me all they can in return for an honest enquiry."

    "I guess operational security hasn't been invented yet," Sharon's dad observed. He, too, was peering to the south. Sharon guessed his own days as a soldier were coming back.

    Ruy paused a moment, turning the new phrase over in his mind. "No, Doctor Nichols," he said. "We have operational bragging, instead. I intend to take advantage. By your leave, Doctor Ambassador wife of mine?"

    "Be careful, Ruy," she said, "and try and make it to the rendezvous by dusk, please."