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Back Cardinal Black Save as PDF
Chapters (44)
  1. Title Page
  2. One: Into the Storm
  3. One
  4. Two
  5. Three
  6. Four
  7. Five
  8. Six
  9. Seven
  10. Two: London Calling
  11. Eight
  12. Nine
  13. Ten
  14. Eleven
  15. Twelve
  16. Thirteen
  17. Fourteen
  18. Fifteen
  19. Three: The Malignant Seven
  20. Sixteen
  21. Seventeen
  22. Eighteen
  23. Nineteen
  24. Twenty
  25. Twenty-One
  26. Twenty-Two
  27. Twenty-Three
  28. Four: Squirrels and Cats
  29. Twenty-Four
  30. Twenty-Five
  31. Twenty-Six
  32. Twenty-Seven
  33. Twenty-Eight
  34. Twenty-Nine
  35. Thirty
  36. Thirty-One
  37. Thirty-Two
  38. Five: Revelation
  39. Thirty-Three
  40. Thirty-Four
  41. Thirty-Five
  42. Thirty-Six
  43. Thirty-Seven
  44. About the Author

Smoke began blowing in from the barn. A fourth bottle came out of the murk and passed Julian’s face by a few inches. As it came in, shattered on the floor and spilled its sizzling oil a shot rang out and fragments of stone from the sill whined about the room.

Matthew found a place to sit away from the oil and went about reloading his pistol. His fingers fumbled. He couldn’t get his thinking straight. Another shot was fired and the bullet thunked into the wall above his head.

“You do know you’ve loaded that gun with three charges, don’t you?” Julian asked him.

Even in his dazed condition and with a dozen places of pain in his body, Matthew realized it was pointless to stay here. He stood up in a crouch.

“We’ve got to go,” he said, his eyes watering from the smoke. “We’ve got to circle through the woods and get that second coach.”

“Agreed,” Julian said with hardly a pause. “Pull your balls in and stand up,” he told Firebaugh.

“Come out!” It was Cardinal Black’s voice from the whirling curtains of smoke. “Devane, you and Corbett have no chance! Make it easier on yourselves!”

“Easier, he says. Fuck him. Stand up, I said, or I’ll haul you up by the nuts.” Julian looked down upon the Autreys. “You two need to get out of here.”

“And go where?” Oliver asked, his face still pinched with pain and his eyes now gray-rimmed with the same shock that affected his wife and Matthew.

“Anywhere but here,” Julian answered.

“Wouldn’t get very far with a broken leg, would I?”

“You might hobble as if your life depends on it, which it does.” Julian advanced upon the doctor, who shrank back in fear. “One word from you, and by God your teeth will be down your gullet. Matthew, don’t put another charge in that damned gun. Get yourself under control.”

“Yes,” Matthew said. Had he said that? “Yes,” he said, loudly to make sure.

“If you decide to stay here,” Julian said to the Autreys, “reload that musket and shoot the first man who rushes through that door … which will happen anytime now.” He sighed heavily. It turned into a series of coughs for smoke was filling the room through the broken windows.

“Get out while you can,” he told Oliver and Greta, and then he motioned with his gun at Firebaugh. “You first. Out the back door. Matthew, you’re behind me. Be watchful. Ready?”

“Yes.”

“Thank you for the hospitality,” Julian said to the innkeeper and his wife. There was nothing else to say, and with a solemn glance to see that several of the paper roses on the Christmas tree had begun to crisp and burn from the splatters of whale oil he put the four barrels of his gun against Firebaugh’s back and shoved the doctor toward the blood-soaked hallway.

Twenty-Nine

Twenty-Nine