Never Sound Retreat Part 18

Vincent watched him intently, not expressing his fears as his old friend leaned forward, coughing, spitting up blood.

"Once Timokin gets his command in battle, make sure the machines stay together," Chuck whispered, "Don't split them up. Still don't like idea of you taking our new flyer up, we lose the element of surprise. Wanted them ma.s.sed as well."

Sighing, he fell silent, looking down at the ground.

"Wish I could go up to the front with you, find out what happens."

"I'll make sure you get the full reports."

Chuck looked at him wanly and smiled.

"We'll see," he whispered, and struggled back to his feet as Kal, perspiration streaming down his face, emerged from the ironclad.

"Frightful machine," Kal announced. "Now let's wee how you plan to stop them hairy devils."

Chuck slowly walked over to a limber wagon, motioning for a gunner to open the lid.

"Give me a solid shot, then load."

Chuck took the ten-pound bolt, walked back to Kal, and handed it to him.

"Standard ten-pound shot, sir, wrought iron."

Behind him the gun crew slammed the round into the breach, followed by a powder bag. Vincent knew that the lieutenant in command of the piece had been nervously sighting and resighting it, but he checked it once again after the interrupted screw breech was slammed shut.

"The first target we'll shoot at is three inches of armor," Chuck announced, "what we think they have mounted on the front of their land cruisers. Notice, sir, that it's mounted vertically, no deflection."

"I suggest, gentlemen, we get behind some cover." Ferguson motioned for the group to get behind a freshly raised breastwork.

The gun kicked back, followed an instant later by a bell-like clang and shower of sparks, a piece of the sh.e.l.l arcing back over the heads of the observers. Vincent had his field gla.s.ses trained on the shield, already knowing what he would see. There was a deep dent, but it had held.

The second shot, aimed at a shield angled back to simulate the front of the land cruiser, did even less damage, the bolt skidding up the side in a shower of sparks.

Two more guns, twenty-pounders, were now brought into play. The round cracked the vertically mounted shield but, like the lighter ten-pound round, skidded off the angled siding.

"A twenty-pounder might shake them up at two hundred yards," Chuck announced, "if the round strikes at a right angle. Any type of deflection over ten degrees or so and again there's a problem."

Chuck looked over at Vincent, who realized that his friend needed help since he was short of breath and going into a coughing spasm.

"The one I saw us knock out," Vincent interrupted, "was. .h.i.t by a fifty-pound muzzle-loading Parrott at approximately three hundred and fifty to four hundred yards, hitting the side armor. The problem is the rate of fire of a fifty-pound muzzle loader is, at best, a round every two minutes, and that's with a crack crew. Unfortunately, the only fifty-pounders we have are mounted on the ironclads, some of our fixed fortifications, or the armored trains. There's not a single field unit in the army. The only reason we had that piece in action was that we stripped it off a ship and moved it by rail. Remember, we are talking about a piece that weighs over six tons. It is simply not usable except in a fixed position."

"In other words, useless for offensive actions," Kal interjected.

"Yes, sir. In a field action, if we let a land ironclad get to under two hundred yards before we can damage it, they've won. Their riflemen will decimate the gun crews at that range and they know that tactic. We might knock out one ironclad, but before our gun crew could reload, the surviving ironclads will be inside our lines. It was h.e.l.l near our fieldpieces, made worse by the ironclad gunners pouring canister In on us. Our gun crews were ripped to shreds."

"So what is the answer, Chuck?" Kal asked.

Chuck looked back nervously at the ten-pounder gun crew and nodded.

"Load it up," he gasped.

The loader ran up from the caisson, cradling what looked like a white sh.e.l.l with a dark base, and slid it into the breech.

"Let's try for the sloped armor," Ferguson announced. The lieutenant commanding the piece nodded and brought the gun to bear on the target, stepped back, and looked at Chuck. Vincent trained his field gla.s.ses on the armor, holding steady as the gun fired.

Again there was a flash of light, and, to his amazement, as the flash and puff of smoke disappeared, he saw a hole drilled clean through the armor.

He looked back at Chuck, who was grinning nervously.

"What the h.e.l.l was that?" Vincent asked.

Chuck led the group over to the limber wagon and motioned for the loader to bring out a round. Vincent took it, noticing a needlelike point at the top of the round, which then disappeared into a casing of what seemed to be papier-mache.

"What the h.e.l.l is this?" Vincent asked.

"It's made of spring steel, the best we've got. The problem with the old sh.e.l.ls are they're made of wrought iron and shatter on impact. They're also too broad. I wanted a narrow point of impact, all the kinetic energy of the sh.e.l.l focused at a single point."

"It looks like an arrow," Kal said, taking the bolt from Vincent.

"Well, it sort of is, sir. We had some sh.e.l.ls back on Earth called Schenkl rounds. They had a papier-mache section designed to engage the rifling. The papier-mache disintegrated as the sh.e.l.l left the barrel. It set me to thinking. On this sh.e.l.l here I have a lead plate that rests on the back of the round to absorb the explosive charge, the papier-mache sets the sh.e.l.l spinning as it goes down the barrel, then it peels away. The fins on the steel bolt keep the round on track, and it punches clean through. Actually, I'm not sure, but I think it melts when it hits the armor and then burns through it, spraying the inside with molten fragments."

"Range?" Vincent asked.

"Ten-pounder, sloping armor or deflection shots out to two hundred yards, twenty-pounder to three hundred. Straight-in shots on vertical armor, the ten-pounder will nail it at over three hundred and fifty yards, the twenty-pounder at five hundred."

"d.a.m.n good," Vincent cried. "Not what I'd hoped for, but pretty d.a.m.n close."

"Well, it's the best I could come up with for now. We're going to use up a h.e.l.l of a lot of good spring steel-it'll cut into our rifle production and a few other things-but I could have several hundred rounds ready to go in less than forty-eight hours. The molds are already made, and the crews standing by to start pouring."

"And you just thought this up overnight?" Kal asked, incredulous.

Chuck shrugged his shoulders. "Well, sir, ever since Hans came back with the report, I've been toying around a bit. Vincent here finally came back with the figures I needed, and so I thought I'd give it a try."

Kal shook his head.

"Amazing how war brings this out in us."

"What's that, sir?" Chuck asked.

"Our creative ability to kill."

Chuck didn't know how to react, but Kal put him at ease, patting him on the shoulder. "We'd all be dead if it weren't for you, Ferguson. Keep thinking up better ways to stop them."

"What I'm trying to do, sir," Chuck replied.

"Now, I've orders from your wife, you ride back in the carriage, no bouncing around on a limber wagon. Get aboard, son," Kal said, urging Chuck over to the carriage and helping him up. Kal looked at Vincent and motioned for him to take a walk, and the young commander fell in by his father-in-law's side.

"Think it will work?"

"Chuck said it, sir. One thing to test it, another thing in the field. It increases our range, but still not out as far as I'd like. Their riflemen can still pepper our artillery, or they can hold back and sh.e.l.l us with those new mortars of theirs. I think the tactic is to hold these new artillery bolts till they get close, then knock out as many of their machines as possible in the first few minutes before Ha'ark catches on."

"Once he realizes it," Kal replied, "he'll use the same thing on us."

"Undoubtedly," Chuck replied, "or beef up his armor-any number of responses. It'll work once, then that's it. The other problem is we could go through three hundred rounds in a couple of minutes. I'll most likely allot them to the best gun crews and make sure they're in the right place at the right time. That and place some of the rounds with our own land ironclads if we can rig them up with bra.s.s cartridge loads in time."

Their walk had carried them downrange, and Vincent stepped around the back of the armor plate and examined the hole.

"h.e.l.l for anyone inside a machine when this busts through," Vincent announced. "Whether it's boiling steel or still solid, it will bang around inside, tearing you to ribbons."

"That's the general idea, isn't it," Kal replied coldly.

"Something like that."

"By the way, there's additional news," Kal said. "It just came in over the wire."

"What?" Vincent asked nervously. Every moment he spent away from the front was an agony, his fear being that Marcus might try to engage before Vincent brought up the rest of the reserves and the dozen land ironclads.

"It's Hans."

"What?"

"He's not moving north. A courier broke through to Marcus this morning. Two arrows in him; he died within minutes after delivering the message. Hans is moving south, pushing to the end of the Green Mountain range and the sh.o.r.e of the Inland Sea. He aims to take Tyre."

Vincent looked at Kal, incredulous.

"Tyre?"

"Makes a h.e.l.l of a problem it does," Kal said wearily. "The Cartha amba.s.sadors made it clear that if we even cross into their territory, it's war."

"d.a.m.n them; they should be fighting alongside us."

"I can understand Hamilcar's position, son. Merki on one side, Bantag on the other."

"Same as us."

"But they can't hold out, while we can. If they don't respond to Hans's move with a declaration of war, the Merki or Bantag will attack and occupy them. Hans's taking Tyre means war on another front."

"The h.e.l.l with them. Hans made the right move," Vincent announced, delighted with the news.

"I'll keep the word from the Cartha amba.s.sador; hopefully they won't know until we've all ready gotten him out," Kal replied.

"Another sea rescue?"

"Something like that. I've sent for Bullfinch to meet with us to plan it out."

Vincent shook his head, then started to laugh.

"It's just like him. I should have thought of that. I feared he was being driven north. Breaking through to Andrew and Pat is one thing, but even then, Ha'ark could have kept Hans bottled up. This puts a whole different light on it."

Kal looked at him, confused. "I thought this was madness."

"It's genius, Father, pure genius," Vincent replied, dropping the formal sir in his excitement. "He's most likely sent some detachments north to confuse Ha'ark, then lit out in the other direction, what they'd least expect. The only d.a.m.n problem is that most of the coast is inaccessible except for Tyre. It's a h.e.l.l of march, 150 miles or more, fighting most of the way, but if he can get down to where the mountains end, Bullfinch can pick him up."

"Fifty thousand men?"

Vincent looked at Kal and shook his head.

"Make it ten, twenty at best," he said quietly. "Maybe twenty-five thousand. It'll take all the shipping we and Roum have, but you better start getting the ships down there now!"

"What I feared." As he spoke he looked back at Chuck, who was sitting hunched over in the carriage.

"He's slipping again."

"I know. d.a.m.n it, Father, send him away now. The climate above Roum might be better for him, maybe that villa Marcus loaned to Colonel Keane after the last war ended. He needs absolute qui bed rest, no worries."

"Chuck not worry?" Kal laughed, and shook his head.

"I know, I know, but we're losing him. Once we head up to the front, get him out of this city. The air here is getting worse all the time." As he spoke he motioned north, to where the factories lining the Vina River were pumping out dark plumes of smoke.

"Strange how you Yankees have changed our land," Kal replied. "As a boy I used to play in the meadows along that same river. Now it's brick, iron, shrieking whistles, a whole new city rising up that will soon be even bigger than Suzdal. Was it that way back in your Maine?"

"Getting that way. Price of progress, of freedom I guess."

A shower of sparks soared up from the ironworks as a batch of molten iron roared out of a furnace. A door in the gunworks swung open, a small switching locomotive emerging, whistle shrieking, pulling a flatcar upon which rested a freshly cast fifty-pound rifled Parrott gun, ready to be shipped to the front.

"This all came from his mind," Vincent said, "the tools of our freedom and our change. Perm save us if we lose him now."

"Perm save us even if we win," Kal replied softly.

"I'm starting to fear that the world is changing beyond anything I ever imagined."

"Fifty thousand men?" Bullfinch gasped, slamming down his mug of vodka so that it spilled across his desk and onto the deck of his cabin.

"That was how many he started with," Vincent said. "Five thousand more deployed north to try and throw Ha'ark off, muck things up a bit. You'll have to sweep the coast and try to pull them off as well."

Bullfinch shook his head and drained off what was left of his drink.

"A bit too much of that lately, Admiral," Vincent said.

"Now don't try and pull your Quaker temperance act on me," Bullfinch snapped. "I remember when you got pretty deep into the bottle yourself."

"So you lost a battle. Who hasn't around here."

"I might have lost the war," Bullfinch grumbled, staring into his mug.

"Maybe you did," Vincent replied coolly.

Startled, Bullfinch looked up.