the starosta's assistants 2

 

Chapter 2

 

The group of five young Ulans clattered into the starosta’s office, followed by their more hirsute companion, who had stopped at a drain on the way in to relieve some pressing discomfort engendered by bouncing in a cart. Ursyn was good about using sanctioned places to relieve himself but was uninhibited about doing so, and proved how uninhibited he was about sorting himself out afterwards, by doing so in the corner of the office.

“Never mind Ursyn, sir,” said Jaracz.

“I was working on not embarrassing him by watching,” said Eugeniusz.

“Oh, thank you, sir,” said Sylwia.

“Think nothing of it,” murmured Eugeniusz, realising that the irony was lost on enthusiastic youngsters. “Which of you are seconded to me?”

“Oh, all of us, and our pocztowy,” said Jaracz. “But Sylwia and Jaras want to go and claim her inheritance; she and the bear ran away from some Zabiełło or other, and her father had already dressed her as a boy, szlachcianka or no, to avoid his advances.”

“Oh, hell,” said Eugeniusz.

“It’s all right, sir,” said Sylwia. “I’m considering duelling him, now I know what I’m doing, because I want to take out a legal blood feud against him, as I’m pretty certain he’s still doing what he was doing to my father, and stealing our lands.”

“It’s grounds for a krwawa waśń,” said Eugeniusz. “I’d like you to check out exactly what’s going on before I issue a writ of legal feud.”

“Yes, my lord,” said Sylwia.

“Can we go with her and sort that out, and come back to help you?” said Jaracz. “We could perhaps leave Halszka in your wife’s care, she joined us at the last minute; her brother is our captain, but she had some problems with a bully who scared her into thinking he could force her to marry him. He can’t; her parents have sense, but you know how it is.”

“I know how it is, and some men can be intimidating,” said Eugeniusz, kindly.

“Been there,” said Felicia. “Don’t worry, Halszka, you can run errands in the office.”

“Thank you,” said Halszka. She felt it very deeply that any one of the young officers, who were little more than children, were more capable than she was. At nearly twenty years old, she was older than any of them except Jaracz Rzędzian, her brother’s friend; but the air of confidence exuded by Sylwia and Jaras, and their friends whom she had met briefly, was unnerving.

Felicia Zabiełło-Wąż smiled at her.

“Don’t worry; the mad Raven way takes a bit of getting used to,” she said. “You’ll be another page to my husband, and as a newcomer, and harmless, you’ll soon find yourself being invaluable for what you can overhear by looking harmless. But you’ll do sabre drill with us, and hopak, to make sure you only look harmless, and can actually take care of yourself.”

“Nobody turns a hair at me being a girl,” said Halszka.

“Why would we?” said Felicia. “It works very well when a girl is finding her way about life.”

There was a disturbance outside.

Eugeniusz looked out of the window, and sighed.

“Old Papa Szałapski again, laying information about his neighbours and trying to stir up trouble. He’s half in his dotage, which he makes worse by getting drunk, and imagines his neighbours creeping into his garden to steal his tools, or assassinate him. He accused his crippled widow neighbour of being a spy for the Bar Confederation and Prussia, and sneaking around his house at night. He also fights, and I’m terrified of hurting him.”

“That’s easy,” said Sylwia. “Ursyn, polonaise the loud one into the cells.”

The bear shambled out, and Sylwia wandered out to whistle ‘Kurdesz’ as the bear gently but firmly took the old man in his arms, and polonezed him all the way to the cells.

“Marvellous!” said Eugeniusz.

“You should pay a good man to be his valet, nurse, and keeper,” said Jaracz. “Believe me, it will be cheaper in the long run than having to sort out all the paperwork of when he gets confused.”

“I won’t say you’re wrong,” said Eugeniusz. “There are relatives of Wilk’s in town, who fled Mieszko Zabiełło, I think one of them would be glad of a job.”

“What of the old man’s relatives?” asked Halszka, diffidently.

“His wife died earlier this year, and I don’t rule out her falling down stairs as a result of one of Szałapski’s traps, but I can’t prove it, and he doesn’t remember it,” said Eugeniusz. “Their daughter lives in Mińsk, which is too far to come readily to visit, and their son is a career officer, and frankly, I think he finds the old man embarrassing.”

“The problems of a Starosta go beyond catching crooks, don’t they?” said Jaracz.

“Far beyond,” said Eugeniusz. “But I’m glad to do the job for Władek.”

 

 

The young Ulans spent some time settling in. There was no military barracks here, and the constables took up the accommodation in the town administrative building. Sylwia and Jaras and Ursyn pushed on to reach Sylwia’s old home before nightfall, and Jaracz went looking for lodgings to house himself and Kordula, along with Halszka and Frydek Adamiak.

Offered less than satisfactory accommodation in various buildings, Jaracz started to become irritable.

“How hard is it,” he said, “To understand that I want three rooms; one for myself and my page; one for the towarzysz; and one for my servant? You know, you can take your accommodation and shove it where the sun don’t shine.”

He proceeded to sweep out three stalls which were not in use in the town hall’s stables, and with Adamiak’s aid, built a bed frame across the width of the far end of each, purchasing rope to stretch a bed base, and linen to put over several blankets on top of sacks of hay from the hay loft. More fabric made curtains for privacy.

“You are ingenious, Jaracz,” said Kordula.

“I’m sick of the insinuations and insolences of these damned townsmen,” said Jaracz. “But I am going to sleep with my wife; we haven’t been married long enough for me to be ready to give that up.”

“We can fit out another stall as a steam bath, my lord,” said Adamiak.

“Good idea!” said Jaracz. “And if any of those bloody constables, half of whom I swear are on the take, make any comments, I’ll knock him down.”

 

 

oOoOo

 

Having probably had a more comfortable night in the stables than in many a lodging house, the three young people partook of a steam bath, as organised by Adamiak, who hung back. Halszka blushing mightily, stuck close to Kordula.

“Join us, Frydek, do,” said Jaracz. “The ladies shall have a curtain for their modesty, and we shall each wash off the sweat with an ewer of water having put the fire out.”

“If you permit, my lord,” said Adamiak.

“I  order,” said Jaracz. “Anyway, you’re three parts Ulan now.”

“I ride too heavy to be an Ulan,” said Adamiak.

“That’s fine, I’m hussar trained,” said Jaracz. “Just imagine that you have a pair of wings.”

“I’m a peasant, my lord,” said Adamiak.

“Oh, hush. I won’t tell anyone if you don’t.”

“You having pretended to be a peasant is one thing; me masquerading as a szlachcic is another,” said Adamiak.

“Oh, well, enjoy the thought of the wings anyway; we won’t get them back,” said Jaracz. “Right, let’s find an eatery and then report for duty.”

 

oOoOo

 

There were constables outside the eatery; they were behind carts.

“What goes on?” asked Jaracz.

“There’s a pair of armed brigands holed up in the baker’s shop over there... my lord,” said the constable. “They have hostages; the baker and his family, and a szlachcianka who was shopping.”

“The devil they do!  What do they want?”

“A couple of horses to be allowed to ride away,” said the constable. “Lord Zabiełło-Wąż has been sent for.”

“Frydek, my lord-brother, I say we should get them a couple of horses,” said Jaracz.

“You’re insane, my lord... brother,” said Adamiak.

Jaracz grinned at him.

“But you know exactly what I mean,” he said. “Constable, tell them we are bringing two good horses.”

“I don’t suppose Lord Zabiełło-Wąż will be pleased to see them get away,” said the constable.

“You have your orders,” said Jaracz.

The constable went forward.

“Horses are being brought for you,” he called. “As an act of good will, release the hostages!”

“The hell we will, not until the horses are brought to us!” called one of the brigands. He pulled an elderly woman forward and brandished a pistol at her, then flung her away from him.  He and his fellow maintained a posture knelt behind the baker’s flimsy shop-front, pointing their firearms into the street.

 

Jaracz’s own horse was a hussar horse, but capable of holding its own with the Ulan horses; and he had procured his man the brother of his own mount, to make sure he could keep up. Adamiak came out of the extensive stables with the two big horses. He also silently passed Jaracz a pitchfork, retaining one for himself. He had placed horse armour on the front of their mounts, and Jaracz nodded approval. The wide metal peytrals would protect their horses’ chests, and Adamiak had seen to provide them each with a crinet for the neck and a chamfron for the face. Adamiak had hastily blacked the armour with soot from the lamp to disguise the shine and make it impossible to see in the crepuscularity of the early winter morning, on the two black horses.

“The hell!” said Jaracz. “Where on earth did you dig up all that bijouterie, my friend?”

“If you mean the armour, it’s kept for discipline for constables to polish, but it’s perfectly good,” said Adamiak.

“Bijouterie means precious stuff; it’s a French word for the sort of geegaws ladies wear,” said Jaracz. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t make jokes with words you don’t know.”

“I know it now, my lord,” said Adamiak. “Like I know all that classical stuff you use to flirt with the mistress.”

“You are an invaluable fellow,” said Jaracz, approvingly. “See, my page, what splendid bijouterie my... lord-brother has found to make these horses fine for delivery. And he even blacked them as well.”

“Oh! I see!” said Kordula, clapping her hands. “Be careful, Jaracz!”

“Of course, my lord-brother,” reminded Jaracz. “Mount up knee to knee. Lance in tok.  Adjust... eh, we have no helmets.”

“Say it if it makes you feel better,” rumbled Adamiak.

Jaracz laughed.

“Adjust Szyszak then... stay in formation... we charge from halfway when it’s too late for them to do anything.”

They walked their horses at an easy amble across the ringing cobble stones of the Rynek, until they reached the middle.

“Now!” said Jaracz. He and his companion kicked with their heels and leaned forward in the saddle, advancing the pitchforks as far forward as the strap on the tok or lance-shoe permitted. It was a piece of equipment strictly for husaria horses, but Jeremi’s misfits carried them so they had more options. There were, after all, plenty of husaria saddles now the winged hussars had been disbanded. And probably most of them were in the possession of the White Raven Banner.

The Raven-trained horses were nothing loath to go from amble to full out charge in one step. They thundered across the Rynek like the knell of doom, which in many ways, for the brigands they were.

The two men tried to fire their pistols at the oncoming equine armageddon; but firing on rapidly approaching targets is never easy, and the two horsemen ignored the discharging of the pistols. They did not even slow at the frontage of the shop.

The flimsy wooden frontage of the baker’s shop disintegrated under the impact, and Jaracz rose in his stirrups as he was taught to drive his pitchfork right into the chest of one of them. Adamiak had seen it done, but though acquainted with many of the horse tricks his master had taught him was slightly less deadly in his approach, managing merely to pin the other to the floor with the tines of the pitchfork each side of his neck.

“Nice; you’ll be in good odour,” said Jaracz. “For some reason, starosti like their prisoners alive and relatively undamaged. Sorry about the mess,” he added to the baker. “The city will cover your losses; tot it up and let the starosta have the bill. Ma’am, sorry about the disturbance.”

“Thank you, young man,” said the elderly szlachcianka.

Jaracz turned his attention to the live brigand.

“Now, I’m going to let you up, so we can remove the rubbish from the scene,” he said. “I hope you are not going to cause trouble; because unless you feel very lucky, it would be a bad idea.”

“Let me up! I need a doctor... I have a lump of wood in my leg from where your damned horses broke through!” yammered the brigand.

“You’ll have a longer lump of wood making its way slowly through more tender parts soon, I expect,” said Jaracz, cheerfully, releasing the man. “I ain’t going to pull that out, it might make you bleed to death and cheat the executioner.”

He tied up the brigand, and put him on his horse, Adamiak draping the dead one over his saddle to take back to the town hall.

 

Eugeniusz turned up as the two hoodlums were being taken to the lower reaches of the town hall. Expecting to have to sort out the trouble, he blinked slightly.

“I said the city would pay for the damage to the man’s shop, szef,” said Jaracz. “It’ll be a trivial amount compared to pacifying the family of an elderly szlachcianka held as hostage.”

“I... a message was brought to me that some brigands, recognised by constables, had taken refuge in a shop and were holding hostages. What on earth did you do?”

“Mounted a lance charge,” said Jaracz with a shrug. “It’s what Ulans do best.”

Eugeniusz raised an eyebrow, glanced over at the wreck of the shop, and decided that if it had worked, he was not about to complain.

“Młocki  said you were capable of subtlety,” he said.

“I am,” said Jaracz. “I just do lance charges well in addition. And it wasn’t a situation where subtlety would have helped. Any gently-gently approach would be met with scorn, and someone would have got hurt.”

“You were on the spot to assess it,” said Eugeniusz. “The one that survived is wanted in several places for capital crimes.”

“And he might yet bleed out when the surgeon takes that bit of stall out of him,” said Jaracz cheerfully.

“He’s your capture; it’s up to you to see that he gives you a full confession before surgery to make sure all the paperwork is in order,” said Eugeniusz.

“Oh, damn,” said Jaracz.

“Carry on, soldier,” said Eugeniusz.

Jaracz turned to his prisoner.

“If you give me a full confession, I won’t let the szlachcianki who work here have a go at torturing you,” he said.

“Hell, yes, but get me some wódka first,” said the prisoner.

The prisoner was ready to give a full accounting of his misdeeds and those of his gang, which he dictated painfully to Jaracz.  He glanced at it and signed.

“You’re supposed to read it carefully so I don’t slip in extra crimes to make my arrest sheet look good,” said Jaracz, severely.

“Just get it over with,” said the brigand.

He was drunk enough by the time the surgeon, who was also the executioner, got to operate, but he still jerked as the knife cut.

“That’s done it,” said the executioner, a lugubrious individual known as Borsuk, Badger, for the white strips of hair in his greying black hair and also in his beard.

“Hit the artery?” said Jaracz. “It was always on the cards, anyway. I got his confession first.”

It would be easier on Kordula and Halszka if they did not have to witness the horrible fate of a highway brigand, to be impaled. Nobody would ever known that Jaracz had made the suggestion to the prisoner that a twitch would bring a quick relatively painless death, since the prisoner had no illusions that he was going to get away this time.