Mad Mikolaj in the Harrogate Dog-sheep, not exactly a bonus

 part 2 of what should have posted yesterday, so two chapters today instead, sorry

 

 

 

Chapter 4 The Harrogate dog-sheep; 1750 haidamak rebellion

 

Mikołaj inspected his men on their return to camp, having been promoted to captain when their own captain fell in battle.

“It would have been a nice little scrap, had we not been fighting those who should be our brothers,” he grumbled to Jurko, who was with him. “Blasted Cossacks, why do they have to rebel from time to time?”

“Because the magnates are shits to them,” said Jurko.

“That, and the rest,” sighed Mikołaj. “Hello, it looks as if the Pegasus has finished with the little shit-for-brains kiss-my-arse-my-man we heaved out of being the principal guest at an impaling. He doesn’t look grateful in the least.”

“Krasiński!” called Aleksander Sączek, of the Pegaz banner, colonel of Mikołaj’s regiment. “Get in my office, now!”

“But I didn’t do it!” said Mikołaj, injured. “It wasn’t consonant with my position as captain, I only thought of it. Besides, there hasn’t been time.”

“Why do I believe that last excuse more than the others?” said the Pegasus.

 

“You’d better tell me about it,” said Sączek.

“It was only wishful thinking, and what I might have done as a wild towarzysz,” said Mikołaj, indignantly. “If anyone drugged the little shit and put him in the sort of frillies only prostitutes wear and left a goat in his bed with him for comfort,  it was someone who overheard me expressing a not unnatural desire to show what we thought of a man more demanding and shrill than a magnate’s mother-in-law.”

“I see,” said Sączek. “I acknowledge the temptation, and by the time I’d finished with him, I might have wished someone had overheard you. You’re not here for that, though.”

“I’m not? I thought you were cross with me.”

“I’m cross, but not with you. And the little shit didn’t help.  I told him if he was so fond of his every whimsies being catered to, I could arrange to get him back on the spike you rescued him from in the nick of time and he could bleat about acceptable food as the stake tore through his guts. He doesn’t like us, but when have we ever been popular with the high ups?”

“Never, I hope,” said Mikołaj.

“Exactly, that’s the spirit,” said Sączek.

“So, if I’m not in trouble....” said Mikołaj, cautiously.

“It seems that the Cossacks are not merely rebelling against Poland, there’s a small group of dissidents making an attempt on Russia. And your father’s old friend, Hryhor Sokołowski got involved...”

“Why am I not surprised!” groaned Mikołaj.

“The problem is, that he and his friends have been arrested by that unwholesomely clever secret policeman, Paweł Skobelew.”

Mikołaj opened his mouth and shut it again.

“I was going to say that Paweł wouldn’t hurt friends of mine, but he has no choice if they were in open armed rebellion,” he said. “How did you find out?”

“Funnily enough, a Cossack got away, and came to us to tell all,” said Sączek. “Says he’s a friend of yours.”

Mikołaj groaned. “Yevheny Lipichenko, my sheep herder.”

“I knew you’d know who he was to sort him out,” said Sączek, cheerfully. “Now, listen, the king values Sokołowski; so it’s up to you to get him out.”

“Of course it is,” sighed Mikołaj. “And here I am without my Gosia, my honeyed intoxicant, being busy with being regulation rations for Seweryn to enjoy a good campaign.”

Sączek opened an inner door of his office and the laughing Yevheny walked out.

Mikolai glowered at him.

“Laugh it up,” he said. “Just remember, without my Gosia with me for good luck, you almost begin to look attractive as a catamite. And certainly as lamb chops.”

Yevheny laughed.

“If I did not know you, you would be frightening,” he said.

“My towarzysze know me and they are frightened of me,” said Mikołaj.

“Maybe they do not observe you well enough.”

“Well, I’m glad you’re not one of them,” said Mikołaj. “Where are they being kept?”

“In the remains of Oryol castle,” said Yevheny.

“I thought it was pulled down fifty odd years ago,” said Mikołaj.

“Mostly,” said Yevheny. “There are still a couple of dungeon rooms, which flood in the wet.”

“Good job for the prisoners that it’s dry weather, then,” said Mikołaj. “Though I suppose threat of flooding might make them move them.”

“Not likely,” said Yevheny. “They’re all due for execution anyway.”

“What a cheerful bugger you are,” said Mikołaj.  “How many are there?”

“A dozen or so,” said Yevheny.

“Well, I want you to get me... two dozen sheepskins,” said Mikołaj.

He had a more esoteric job for Jędrek; but he also trusted his oldest friend to manage his commission.

“You want what? A dozen dogs?” barked Jędrek.

“Well-trained dogs. Sled dogs for preference,” said Mikołaj. “Trained not to bark except on command.”

“What lunacy are you up to now?” groaned Jędrek.

“Deadly lunacy,” said Mikołaj. “If they catch us, torture and death.”

“I’m inclined to leave Sokołowski to it,” grumbled Jędrek. “He’s a dour bugger at the best of times.”

“Papa owes him,” said Mikołaj.

Jędrek sighed.

That was sufficient to tell him that Mikołaj would not be swayed from his purpose.

“Jurko,” said Mikołaj, “I need you to be a prosperous Russian. And I want you on the road to somewhere between Oryol and Moskwa. There, when Paweł Skobelew stops on the road, I want his carriage sabotaged sufficiently well to hold him up for several days.”

“Yes, Mikołaj,” said Jurko. “Do I want to know why?”

“A prank on my dear friend,” said Mikołaj. “And Walenty, Adam, a fireworks celebration; nice and noisy.”

The two young men nodded, and Mikołaj chortled.

“It’ll either be glorious or we’ll all be dead,” he said.

“I’m voting for the glorious,” said Adam.

“Me too,” said Walenty.”

“We’ll be dead,” said Jędrek. “What on earth is that a diversion for?”

“Explosives, of course,” said Mikołaj.

“Sokołowski hates explosives,” said Adam.

“Well, then, saving his life with them gives him another good reason to do so,” said Mikołaj. “I may feel we owe Sokołowski, but I don’t have to like him.”

 

 

oOoOo

 

Hryhor Sokołowski looked up when a shadow occluded the moon in his partly underground cell on the river bank. The damned Moskale were keeping them awake again, this time with fireworks.

He saw a grinning face with blond moustaches and beard. He opened his voice to comment, and shut it again.

“Hello,” said the face. Something shaped like a quarter of a cheese box was placed against each bar.

In point of fact, it was a quarter of a cheese box, reinforced with lead. Sandbags tamped the charge, and the face drew on a clay pipe and lit slow match.

The head disappeared.

Someone was humming Bach’s little fugue.

Then the night split open in a torrent of fire and noise.

 

Things quietened down and it might be seen that not only were the bars cut and mangled, but a large hole had appeared below them.

“Well that went with a bit more of a bang than I expected,” said Mikołaj. “Substandard walls, obviously; may be due to being flooded from time to time.”

“Mikołaj Krasiński! I might have guessed! Did you have to blow us all to kingdom come?” said Sokołowski, exasperated.

“Be damned! I tamped it carefully so the blast was mostly outwards and down,” said Mikołaj, injured. “Unless you want me to leave you here?”

“You blond brat! Always so cock-sure!  Well, from now on, I’m in charge,” spat Sokołowski.

“Really? You know how to use the resources I provided?” said Mikołaj, with heavy sarcasm. “Go ahead, I have four barges, a team of dogs, and two dozen sheepskins, but if you’re in charge, I’m taking my people out on my own. I don’t trust you.”

“I... I suppose I am under your orders,” said Sokołowski, sulkily.

“Praise the Queen of Poland! Now shift instead of yapping, we have to find some reeds downstream.”

 

Four barges grounded against some reed beds some mile or so out of town.

“Right, cut reeds and bundle them to look like a dozen men sitting in the barges, and then we push them off down river,” said Mikołaj.

“Why aren’t we going downriver?” said Sokołowski.

“Because we’re going to be where we aren’t looked for,” said Mikołaj, with patience. “We’re heading north, through Oryol.”

“Boy, have you lost your mind?” barked Sokołowski.

Mikołaj regarded him with disfavour.

“Are you going to continue to question my genius or would you like to go back to wait for Paweł Skobelew, who will be regretful, for my sake, as he breaks your body to tell him every detail of your fool plot, or are you going to acknowledge that I’m as brilliant as my father?” he said, coldly. “My father still owes you one, or I’d have left you to rot. I don’t like you, Sokołowski, I think you’re a cruel and unnatural father, and you’re an inept plotter. But our families have ties which go back time immemorial, and it behoves me to rescue you. But not at the risk of your men and mine, do I make myself absolutely, paradigmatically, pellucidly clear?”

“You do,” growled Sokołowski.

“Good,” said Mikołaj. “I hope the rest of you can bleat. You’re about to put on fur jackets and sheepskins, and lurk inside my pack of hounds carefully clad in sheepskins, giving the impression of being a herd of Harrogate silky-haired dog-sheep, trained to herd themselves.”

“I never heard such insanity,” said Sokołowski.

“Trust me,” said Mikołaj.

“I hate it when a Krasiński says that.”

 

oOoOo

 

Jędrek had surpassed himself, and had managed to get hold of fur leggings and long gloves for the escapees to wear under their sheepskins; and the sheepskins were tied securely onto the hounds and combed to look natural.

Jędrek went ahead to allow the escapees to walk fairly naturally in less inhabited regions, and signalled to get down as several Cossack police officers thundered along the banks of the river.

“Hey! You!” said one of them.

“Are you addressing me, my man?” said Mikołaj, who was resplendent in red brocade.

The policeman goggled.

“My apologies, my lord, I’m looking for escaped prisoners. On a barge.”

Mikołaj scratched the back of his neck.

“There were some barges which went downstream overnight,” he said. “Would they be them?”

“Very likely; thank you, my lord,” said the Cossack. “I... what have you there?”

“A new thing out of England,” said  Mikołaj, enthusiastically. “Silky-haired dog-sheep, which can herd themselves.”

The Cossack crossed himself.

“Well, I call it unnatural,” he said.

“Well, the English priests said it was permitted, if you can cross a horse with a donkey and get a mule, stands to reason you can cross a sheep with a sheepdog and get a dog-sheep,”

The Cossack spat, nodded, and resumed his speedy ride.

 

oOoOo

 

Mikołaj put his herd in a pen in the centre of Oryol  in the late afternoon, whilst he stopped for a beer. They had all drunk deeply before entering the town.  He ran into Pavel Skobelev.

“Paweł, my dear little goldfish!” said Mikołaj, happily. “What are you doing here?” he embraced the secret policeman.

“Chasing fugitives,” said Pavel. “Now, I suppose you wouldn’t have anything to do with the blowing out of the wall of the gaol and the removal of sundry prisoners I was coming to question?”

“Me? How could I?” said Mikołaj. “I was bringing a herd north to add to my own lands. Amazing creatures! Bred in England, silky-haired dog-sheep, able to herd themselves and defend themselves against wolves. Damned slow pace, though, as you know.”

“Dog-sheep?”  said Pavel, helplessly.

“Come and see,” said Mikołaj, taking him out, and reaching to scratch sundry backs, caressing the silky muzzles of the dogs around the outside.

“God in Heaven!” said Pavel. “If I hadn’t seen it, I wouldn’t have believed it. Where will all this selective breeding end?”

“Doubtless with people being gestated inside pigs, and farrowed en masse and bred to undertake particular jobs which they further train at as they grow up,” said Mikołaj.

“I hope not,” said Pavel. “Be on your way, you scoundrel!”

The herd of dog-sheep ambled off, with much shouting on the part of Mikołaj and his pyrotechnic cohorts, who had met up with him in the town. Jurko was waiting out of town, and as the crepuscular shadows stole across the road, the herd wandered off it into light woodlands.

“You’re on your own now,” said Mikołaj. “Make your way back home quietly and circumspectly, and don’t get caught.” 

“Thank you,” said Sokołowski, stiffly. “I did not think it would work.”

“It’s crazy enough to be so unbelievable it has to be true,” said Mikołaj. “Jędrek, do we have to give the dogs back?”

“No, I bought them,” said Jędrek.

Mikołaj was patting the leader of the pack.

“We’d better let them make their way home,” he said, regretfully.

“And where are we going?” asked Jędrek.

“We’re holing up for a week or so in the little mansion we built so that the hue and cry will thunder past us and utterly ignore us,” said Mikołaj. “Then we’re cutting across country through Lithuania. And whilst we’re there, we might as well patch the shelter up. I had Jędrek bring stores there, so it’s available for emergencies. It may not be as large as the one we built last year, but it did us well enough.”

Mikołaj’s idea of patching up involved building a proper structure from logs, but as they were staying there several days, as he said, what else did they have to do?

His friends, as always, fell in with his wishes; it was easier.

“And we had the most extraordinary good fortune,” said Adam, laughing. “We fell in with some nobleman who was celebrating the marriage of his son and heir, and persuaded him that what he needed to make the occasion go with a real bang was fireworks. He gave us enough to buy fireworks to add to what we had, I don’t believe there was a silent moment for an hour and a half. Glorious!”

“Oh, that’s how you did it,” said Mikołaj. “I must say, I thought it had fallen to you and Walenty to fart for the last bit.”

He suffered being pummelled, still laughing.

 

A week later, they left their little hut, leaving provisions there, just in case, and a week after that, were back in camp, offering a report.

 

oOoOo

 

Pavel Skobelev’s report was less happy.

“I am sorry, my Tsarina, I lost them,” said Pavel. “As I reported, whilst I was on my way to where the insurgents had been imprisoned, their friends took advantage of the fireworks display put on, to celebrate a wedding, to blow a hole clean through the prison wall.”

“Could the fireworks display have been staged on purpose?” asked the Tsarina.

“No, the nobleman has been preparing for the wedding since before the uprising, and is, moreover, staunchly supportive of you,” said Pavel, who had no idea, and indeed, had not thought to ask, if the fireworks had been a last-minute, impromptu, addition. “But it worked out well for the friends of the insurgents, who blew a very neat hole in the wall, and got away with four barges. By the time our men were on their trail, the barges had long gone downstream. We don’t even know where they disembarked, or on which bank, as they sent the barges further on with dummies made of reeds, to pass as people at first glance. My men chased them further that needed because of this, and lost perhaps as much as a day. You know how these damned Cossacks are, they melt back into the population, and one can hardly, without absolute certainty round up a whole village.”

“No, quite. Still, it was not a large force. I think we mark the report closed. Nothing more happening?

“No, all quiet on the Western frontier.”