Stone That the Builder Refused - Madison Smartt Bell [72]
Guiaou gained a moment by smashing his pistol barrel into the face of the nearest militiaman, feeling the dampened crunch as cartilage gave way. Guerrier had set the stock of his empty musket to his shoulder and galloped in, guiding his horse with only his knees. His bayonet struck another Spaniard and swept him backward over the tail of his own horse. But Guiaou could not find Couachy. He wheeled his horse out of the melee and turned. Now he saw Couachy getting up from the dirt, one arm swinging loose from the bloody shoulder and the other reaching. Guiaou switched his discharged pistol for his coutelas and glanced at Guerrier, who rode at the Spanish again with his bayonet fixed as before. Guiaou moved toward Couachy, who made a spring to reach him, but as he jumped there was a whole volley of shots and Couachy’s arm was limp, jelly-like when Guiaou’s hand grasped at it. The arm ran through his fingers like water and Couachy slipped down under the hooves as the horses shocked together again. Guiaou took a tremendous blow to his helmet, from a saber or gun butt, he didn’t know, but it was hard enough to blur his sight. He swung his horse into the clear. There were too many, too many to fight.
His vision resolved and he saw that he was riding on the blind girl now, who still stood paralyzed and mute, the red blots much darker against the sudden pallor of her skin. If one of the boys who’d betrayed them had been standing in her place, Guiaou would have cut him down with joy, but he turned away from the girl at the last moment, slashed her guide string and rode through, with a quick glance over his shoulder to see that Guerrier was following. Further back, the French officer and another militiaman had jumped down to flip over Couachy’s body, which lay face down in the dirt, but the rest of the Spaniards were pursuing.
In a flash Guiaou and Guerrier had crossed the tree line. Green branches whipped Guiaou across the face. He plastered his upper body along the horse’s neck. There was space enough among the pines for them to hold their pace, and they had the better horses. When they’d lost the Spaniards deep in the pines, they cut back in the direction of the road, halting finally at a point a quarter-mile north of the house. Guiaou took the time to load his pistol. He was still breathless, so he only motioned to Guerrier, who seemed to take his meaning well enough. They rode behind the screen of pines until the barn had lined up with the house, and then came out into the open, urging their horses to the gallop as they crossed the rise. Only two militiamen had stayed by the house, and they did not have time to reach their horses. Guiaou hacked the first one down with his coutelas and Guerrier pinned the other to the house wall with the bayonet.
By the overturned kettle the older woman lay across the body of her husband, her shoulders heaving silently. Further off, the blind girl turned in a widening spiral, her arms outstretched, with nothing to grasp. Guerrier covered her with his musket, but Guiaou pushed the barrel aside. He dropped to his knees beside Couachy’s body. Couachy’s eyes were showing white and his mouth hung slack and there was a paste of blood and dirt on his teeth. Guiaou turned out all his pockets—empty. The true letter was gone from his waistband as well.
Guerrier stood looking unhappily at the twisted bayonet on his musket. He’d broken off the point with the force of his charge against the house wall. Now he picked up the musket of one of the dead militiamen and compared