Halls of Montezuma Read online

  The door was locked, predictably, and a voice called out from the other side. “Go away, I’m busy! I told you not to bother me when I’m busy!”

  Case grunted, leaned back onto his left foot, tensed, and transferred everything to his right, slamming it into the paneling alongside the lock. It splintered and the door shook violently, and the sound of wood being torn apart came to him, but the door held. Only just.

  “What the fuck?” the voice declared in surprise and outrage.

  Case wasted no time but repeated the assault and this time the lock broke, the door swinging in sharply. Case rushed in to see Whitby buttoning up his pants hurriedly, reaching for a pistol lying on a small side table by the bed he’d been on. Tied to the bed was a naked girl, weeping. She’d been raped and whipped. The marks were too clear. Her mouth was blocked with a rag and her eyes dully watched as Case entered the room.

  Whitby grabbed the pistol and swiftly cocked the hammer, raising the barrel to Case’s chest level, his face a mask of fury. Case knew he’d a fraction of time to react, and the whip that had been used to subdue the girl was lying conveniently to hand on the floor. He dived forward just as the gun roared, and the bullet passed harmlessly by the smash into the wall.

  The pistol’s report would bring everyone running, so Case grabbed the whip and got to his feet, bringing it over his head. The pistol fired again, the bullet passing closer but still missing him. Whitby hadn’t got the skill of a gunman, and he was in a panic. His shot had been rushed and it went high.

  Case cracked the whip which scored a mark across Whitby’s face. He screamed and both hands went to his face, and Case rushed him. His shoulder took him under the breastbone and the rat-faced criminal was sent crashing into the far wall, Case’s weight adding to the force of the impact. The man’s breath shot out of him in an explosive oofff!! And the pistol was wrenched out of his grasp.

  Whitby sank to his knees, now released by Case and he clutched his facial wound in agony.

  “You’re the worst sort of scum there is,” Case growled, the pistol in his fist. “Burning kids, raping girls. Hell, she’s not even fully grown!” He reached across and tested the bonds holding the adolescent to the bedposts. They were rope and tied firmly. The girl shook fearfully, tears running down her face. Case pulled the rag out of her mouth and swung round to face Whitby who had got to his feet, trying to staunch the blood dripping down his cheek. “I ought to kill you right now.”

  “She’s just a street kid!” Whitby protested, “she’d’ve died out there. Here she’d have a roof and clothes!”

  “And a life of servitude to filth like you. I’d rather be out on the street.”

  Pounding feet and voices of alarm came to them from out in the corridor and two men suddenly appeared at the doorway. Case recognized the battered features of Hartley as one of them. Hartley’s eyes widened and Case swung the pistol round. “You bastard. It was you who told this scum here where I was. You’re just as much to blame for the burning down as he is.”

  Hartley looked at Whitby and turned to the other man, a dull-eyed thug holding a shotgun that Case didn’t care much for. “Kill the bastard!”

  The thug raised the shotgun but Case was ready. His pistol blasted the man backwards across the corridor, his chest shattered. The shotgun clattered to the floor and the thug slumped slowly down the wall, his eyes turning up into his head. Hartley ducked aside fearfully, but suddenly Case was aware of Whitby moving behind him. He swung round, dropping to his knees and the knife intended for his back cut the air inches from his face.

  Case shot back in a reflex and Whitby cried out in pain, his left hand smashed by the bullet. Case turned again to see Hartley pick up the shotgun and Case fired as he turned, the bullet missing Hartley and striking the wall beside him. More voices came to him and Case grabbed a sobbing Whitby and pushed him in front of him out of the room. He had no time to untie the girl at the moment; he’d have to sort out the mess developing in the corridor first.

  Hartley knelt in the corridor, shotgun pointing at Case, but Whitby was an effective shield, so Hartley got to his feet and backed away, still keeping the shotgun pointing at the two. Case dragged Whitby along with him to the end of the passage where the staircase began. Hartley stepped to one side along the landing, his eyes still and watchful. “You ain’t gonna get away, Lonnergan,” he said evenly.

  “Shut up. You’re little nest here is finished; once the folk out there know you burned down the poor house I don’t think they’ll tolerate your presence here, even if you have guns.”

  Whitby moaned and held his wounded hand tightly, his face covered in sweat. Just then a door opened and another man appeared, a pistol pointing at Case. Case realized he was outflanked and shoved Whitby at Hartley to put the shotgun wielder off balance for a second while he desperately swung the pistol round 90 degrees to the new threat, but even as he did so he knew he was too late.

  The man’s gun fired and Case felt a hammer blow in his chest and pain exploded from there all over his body. He felt himself lifted off his feet and was vaguely aware he had hit the banister of the landing and had gone through it. There was a moment’s weightlessness as he fell and then another wave of agony hit him as he struck the floor below and all went black.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Being immortal doesn’t mean immunity from wounds or pain. Case – or Casca – had been “killed” many times in the past and had undergone the agony of rebirth as the Curse that Jesus had put on him at the crucifixion worked its wonders on his shattered body.

  Case lay there at the foot of the staircase, to all the world as one dead; but inside his body the repair of his wounds was going on at a miraculous pace. He dreamed, unaware of the conscious world, his mind returning to that fateful day on Golgotha when he’d been part of the execution squad with the four other Legionaries.

  The wind whipped past him as he held his pilum – his spear – towards the man on the cross, Jesus. The crucified man looked down at him as he approached, intending to end the man’s agony on the cross. Casca drew in his breath as he looked up at the bloody prisoner. “Well, Jew,” he said, “it’s about time to get this over with.”

  Jesus seemed to come to life at his words. He raised his head to the darkened sky and cried out. To Casca it seemed he had said “O my father, why hast thou forsaken me?”

  Casca frowned, puzzled at the words. He thought Jesus spoke Aramaic, but he understood every word. The wind whipped up dust round his legs, becoming stronger by the minute. Thunder rumbled in the distance and the first spots of rain began to strike the dust, forming wet circles on the ground. “Why has your father forsaken you? You fool; we are all forsaken from the time we first draw breath.” He wrapped his red army cloak about him and raised his pilum. “It’s time to get this over. I’ll try to make it as painless as possible.”

  The two other Roman legionaries still at the site of the crucifixion were cowering from the imminent storm, cloaks over their heads, so they did not witness what happened next. Casca drew back his spear and lunged upwards, aiming for the heart. Although the blade sank deep into the pale skin, he missed his target. He withdrew and prepared to try again.

  It seemed as though the skies broke open at that moment. Thunder crashed and rain poured down. Blood and fluid splattered from the wounded Jesus onto Casca’s hand and down the shaft of his spear. The Jew opened his eyes and fixed them on Casca’s.

  Casca’s bowels turned to ice. He’d never seen such intensity and power emanate from anyone’s eyes before. Jesus spoke. “Soldier, you are content with what you are. Then that you shall remain until we meet again. As I go now to my father, you must one day come to me.”

  Casca stood in fear, and by a reflex put his blood spattered hand up to his mouth. The instant the fluid passed his lips he felt a sudden cramp run through his body, a burst of agony so sudden it brought him to his knees. As he sank down, the dying Jesus spoke once more to him. “Until we….. meet again…”

 
Casca clutched his stomach, his fingers hooking deep into his body. The pain was as nothing he’d experienced before, his limbs shaking by their own volition and he was vaguely aware his bladder was emptying itself into the soil and down his legs. He shook and gasped helplessly as the now dead Jew’s blood purified his body, changing him, altering his physical being.

  His life would never be the same again.

  In his dreamlike state he sobbed for the loss of his mortal existence.

  “Hush,” a voice came to him, “lie still.”

  He wondered where the voice came from, it was soft, feminine. Maybe an angel’s? Why then, he mused, did he still feel pain? And why did he think of an angel when he was a Roman legionary and angels were part of the Catholic Christian belief? Roman soldiers hadn’t even heard of angels! Angels weren’t even thought of in Roman times! Memories flooded into his brain, almost too fast for him to recognize them before they were gone, succeeded by the next. He realized they were his life story from that fateful day onwards. He caught a glimpse of working deep in the copper mines of Greece but they were gone, mercifully, before he saw the blood soaked sands of the arena where gladiators battled for freedom or merely their own lives. The drum beat of the hortator on the slave galleys of Rome was more imagined than heard and he felt the soft flesh of Neda, his first love.

  But even as he looked round for her she was gone, replaced by the corpse strewn field of Ctesiphon and he standing there weeping in anguish at the realization his life would be more of the same. Blood, death. He wept.

  “Please, be still,” the soft feminine voice insisted. Casca tried to remember where he’d heard that voice before. He saw Glam the giant German laughing, a monstrous horn of mead in his giant hand, and the sightless face of Lida. He tried to reach her but she was gone even as he did so, replaced by the top of a pyramid and the blood soaked sacrificial altar of the Teotecs during the storm when his heart would be cut out.

  He gasped in pain, the waves bringing him to awareness. Was his heart still cut? A hand pressed on his shoulder, clutching it tightly. “Please, Mr. Lonnergan, lie still.”

  He groaned and opened his eyes. He was back in the real world, in a world of real pain. His chest felt like someone had set fire to it. He remembered the shot. He also remembered he healed at a fantastic rate. What if the woman had noticed? How would be explain that away?

  Who was he? Where was he? What bloody language?? What had she said? Lonnergan? Oh yes, that was who he was. And the language had been English. He remembered where as well. Philadelphia. Or that’s where he had been, but now he was in a covered wagon from what he could tell, rumbling along some god-awful road. Which meant of course, he’d been unconscious for a long time.

  And where, for that matter, was that bastard Whitby? He opened his mouth and croaked. Well shit, so much for speaking. Try again.

  The woman above his head hushed him once more. He’d definitely seen her before. Ann. Yes, Ann McGuire, that’s who she was. A pretty young thing, pale skinned, blue eyed. Hair a little severely tied back with a center parting, but that was the fashion these days. “Ann.”

  “Yes that’s me, Mr. Lonnergan. Now hush. Ye’ve been hurt badly and need to rest.”

  “Aahh… my chest hurts like hell,” he said huskily. His mouth tasted like the bottom of a vulture’s nest too.

  “And what would you know of that place, Mr. Lonnergan?” Ann asked, her face disapproving. “Best not to speak of such places. Now, drink this.”

  A tin mug was put to his lips and he obediently sipped the liquid. It was cool, fresh and welcoming. Water, but clean. He nodded his thanks and relaxed, or tried to. The pain in his chest made that a challenge. He glanced down and saw his chest swathed in bandages and dressings. “Nice job,” he commented. “Where am I?”

  “In a wagon on our way to Lynchburg.”

  Lynchburg? Case wondered where that was. He’d not come across that name before. All the –burg places were in Virginia, Maryland and Pennsylvania from his hazy memories of the embryonic United States; but he had been gone too long to remember accurately. “How long we been gone? How am I here?”

  Ann put a finger to his lips and smiled. “Now now, too many questions. Well, ye’re looking strong enough to speak, so ye are. But ma told me not to excite ye, and she’s not one to disobey.”

  Case grinned. She certainly wasn’t. He craned his neck up as he tried to peer forward, but the wagon was piled with too many objects and items to see much. He did see another figure sat with its back to him way ahead, and when he looked down past his legs which were under a thin blanket, he could see three figures sat at the rear, looking out.

  Ann put the mug to his lips again and he sipped. She sat back and watched him for a moment. Case flexed his legs and they seemed to work okay. Ann shook her head and put the blanket back to a neat position. “Well, ye’ll be restless until I tell ye, so ye will. That girl ye sent to St. Peter’s raised holy uproar so she did, and Father Lynch came over himself, so he did, followed by such a crowd of people in rage. Father Lynch calmed them all and we entered that terrible place and the first thing we saw was ye lying there.”

  Case waited for Ann to continue. “Ma was in such a fuss! We thought ye dead but Father Lynch said ye would be alive, so he did. And he was right. How he knew only God may know, perhaps God told him. In any case, ma told me to take care of ye, so she did. We moved ye to the church and Father Lynch came back and said all those devils had gone, leaving behind so many poor wounded girls to be cared for.”

  “I can imagine. Whitby was gone? Pity.”

  Ann pursed her lips. “Now let’s not get all vengeful. The Lord may have vengeance, but not us mortals.”

  “No,” Case agreed, “best leave that to immortals.” His voice was dry.

  Ann nodded. “Well, the wound in ye chest was bad and I thought ye would die, but somehow ye pulled through. Father Lynch even poured holy water on ye wound and by the Holy Virgin it seemed to speed up the healing! He told me not to say anything to anyone about that, but if he can work such miracles why doesn’t the church use him for much better things, I’m asking myself?”

  “Why indeed?” Case muttered, thinking furiously. It seemed too good to be true that the priest accepted the power of the holy water; and why indeed did he do it anyway? He also seemed to know Case would pull through from a wound that would kill most men. What did the priest know? Case felt chilled inside, for what he was thinking he didn’t want to admit. More of that after some deep thinking, he decided.

  “Ah, he’s awake,” Mary McGuire’s voice interrupted his thoughts. The older woman had heard Ann talking at last over the noise of the harnesses, horse hoofs and the wheels rumbling on the road. Ann’s mother had turned round in her seat and was looking at the patient. “We’ll stop here for lunch. Ann, get Bridget and Patrick to unpack the food.”

  Ann got to her feet, steadying herself as the wagon lurched to the right, and attracted the attention of the three younger children who were sat on the tailboard watching the world recede behind them. Case struggled to sit up, finding the pain in his chest inhibiting, and he cursed under his breath, as he had to lie back down again. The bullet must have done more damage than he thought. Hopefully the damned thing had passed through but he suspected it was still lodged somewhere in his ribs. It would work itself out given time but until then he’d have discomfort to some degree.

  The wagon stopped and the children jumped off excitedly, chattering aloud. Mary vanished, obviously tending the horses. Case frowned. Whose horses were they? Who the hell had given the McGuires the wagon? Why leave Philadelphia? He’d have to find out, and the need to know gnawed at him. Besides, he was a terrible patient and he wanted to get to his feet and be about, rather than linger in a bed inside a covered wagon filled with blankets, boxes and various bric-a-brac.

  “Now, let’s see how ye are, Mr. Lonnergan,” Mary announced her return. She stepped into the interior of the wagon and studied him critically. “Oh, ye’re a
strong man, so ye are, and a blessed one too! Father Lynch said as much.”

  “What else did he say?” Case asked, desperately wanting to know more about the enigmatic catholic priest.

  “Well he helped us, so he did. Such a kindly man, a heart of gold. After he rescued those poor girls from that place of sin he arranged for ye to be cared for at his housekeeper’s home next door. After that he decided ye’d be best coming with us out of Philadelphia into the country. Mr. Driscoll here brought his wagon to transport us to Virginia and the good Father suggested ye come with us. Plenty of space there, unlike in Philadelphia. Farms to be tended and the like, and I’m thinking a big strong man like yeself would do wonders to God’s earth and make it produce food. Patrick will be grown soon in a few years, to be sure, and I’m thinking ye could teach him a thing or two.”

  Case shrugged. “I’ve farmed before, Mrs. McGuire, but I’m a soldier. A poor farmer I’d make.” Who the devil was Mr. Driscoll?

  “Aye, judging by ye body I’m thinking to myself here’s a man who’s drunk his cup of sorrow to the full, so I am.”

  Case eyed what part of his upper body was not covered by the blanket or bandages. Scars criss-crossed his chest, arms and shoulders, a legacy of the many battles he’d been in over eighteen centuries. “Yes,” he said, “not a pretty sight for you or the children.”

  “Not a sight I wish to see on another either,” the middle-aged woman agreed. “Ye must have suffered.”

  “I survived,” Case grinned. “Nothing to worry about now, and thanks to the expert care I’m getting, this wound will soon heal too.”

  “Aye,” Mary said, hesitantly. “Well,” she brightened, “what would ye say to some cheese and bread?”

  “That would be wonderful, Mrs. McGuire,” he said. He realized just how hungry he was. He must have been out for a few days. Where they were now was anyone’s guess, and the countryside he could see out of the wagon was wooded in places, but elsewhere was made up of fenced off fields.