War Path (11 page)

The local citizens were glad for the constant comings and goings of the freighters, the steady stream of trappers and Indians, and for the presence of the French marines stationed in the fort. Such traffic filled the purses of the merchants with gold and provided a livelihood for the farmers and craftsmen, all of whom turned a blind eye when it came to the vice-ridden establishments spawned by the brisk commerce.

“On to Fort Carillon,” said Turcotte, mimicking the effeminate French officer with the cold blue eyes. Standing at the stern of the bateau, a shallow draft boat manned by nine rivermen who propelled the craft against the current with oar and pole, Benoit Turcotte kept a firm grip on the steering oar, his coarse hands the color of the weathered oak.
“Mais oui
, our brothers and sisters to the south cannot go another day without salt pork and dried apples and flint!” The freighter spat on the floor of the bateau. He could sense his crew watching him and did not doubt they agreed with him. He was certain Captain Barbarat and his aides would find time for a taste of wine and a lady's caress. Officers never went without. But there was not a man in uniform that could have endure the rugged life of a
voyageur
. Of that Turcotte was certain.

Yes, he wanted a woman. He quietly appraised the eight men that made up his crew. Ha, they all did. And five miles from Fort Carillon, fortune provided. Here along the rocky lakeshore, where the tail of the lake angled off toward Lake George, the forests of pine, oak, maple and birch grew down to the water's edge. Back beyond the trees a network of shallow caves and overhanging shale ledges had provided shelter for Abenaki hunting parties since time immemorial. But a new resident had taken over one of the natural caverns and hung a wide wooden sign down by the shore for all the rivermen to see.

Corette's La Chute.

It was a natural landing, a perfect site. And as Benoit Turcotte and the
voyageurs
perused the cavern in the trees, three lovely
femmes
strolled from the shadowy recesses and hurried down the shaded path to the water's edge where they called out to the men in the bateau and urged them to come ashore and pass the time in song and drink and perhaps a dalliance or two or ten.

“Sacre bleu
, will you look at that?” another of the men spoke up, leaning forward on his oar. He gestured with his stocking cap and then waved at the woman who had just lifted the hem of her skirt to permit them a glimpse of her ankles. She wore no cotton stockings and was a comely lass with long, thick, fiery red tresses and oval features like fine rare china. She must be new at her trade, he decided, because there was a freshness about her, a virginal spring to her step as she waved to the river men and invited them to join her and her sisters.

“Bonne journee, mes chers. Que les jeunes hommes étes beaux.”
The woman's voice carried to them across the sun-dappled surface of the lake. It was a sweet sound, like the wind in the hemlocks or dewdrops on lady slippers, lo, the pale pastel sky captured in a water bead. “Good day, dear ones. What handsome lads you are.
Jouez avec mes amies et moi
. Come play with my friends and me.”

Turcotte glanced over his shoulder.
“Que dites-vous, des hommes?
What do you say, men? Captain Barbarat is twenty miles behind downriver. His orders cannot reach us.” That settled the matter. The rivermen cheered and began to pull in earnest for the landing. Fort Carillon could wait, as long as they reached the settlement by sunset, where was the harm?

As Turcotte looked on, eyes aglow with excitement, the other two ladies, both of them taller than the first who had called to them, waved their kerchiefs and beckoned the freighters who took lustful note of how tightly the women's bodices were laced about their abundant bosoms and how they flaunted their charms, these wantons in their drawstring skirts.

“Pull, my brothers. Bring us quickly to shore,” said the man at the stern. The oarsmen did not need to be told what to do, they could hear music now. Someone was playing a fife within the cavern. And a couple of men who appeared to be the proprietors emerged to see what all the commotion was about and on seeing the bateau, quickly set a pair of oaken kegs on the wooden tables in the shade beneath the ledge. Turcotte imagined the interior of the cave provided entertainment of a more intimate nature. M'lady would have her boudoir set to the rear.

“Pull on those oars, lads, pull I say for I have a powerful thirst.”

“Drink can wait,” said the man closest to Turcotte. Claude Lanyon at the first oar lock had his eyes on the ladies. He looked as if he were ready to charge across the water. The man all but vaulted over the three-foot side of the boat.

“Careful, M'sieur Lanyon. Will you walk upon the water? I say do not. After all, you are a Frenchman, not God,” Turcotte merrily exclaimed as he guided the thirty-foot-long craft up on to the riverbank. As the oarsmen clambered out of the boat, the harlots retreated up the slope, laughing and carrying on like the flirts they were. Depending on their age and disposition, Benoit Turcotte was of a mind to try them all.

The brisk October air was pungent with the smell of wood smoke, spilled rum, tobacco, and the mouthwatering aroma of frying fish. He wrinkled his nostrils and caught the scent of lilac and rosewater. Turcotte vaulted over the side of the bateau and helped his crew drag the boat farther up onto the muddy embankment. Then with a whoop and a holler the
voyageurs
charged up the slope, heading right for the cavern and the three women.

Turcotte was squat and thick-skinned, slightly bowlegged, weathered as an old oar, with a marked fondness for rum and whores, the taller the better and he headed straight for the longest-limbed lass who coyly avoided his crude approach. Benoit frowned, struggled to keep his temper under control, swallowed his pride and continued to pursue the harlot who had caught his fancy.
“Bon matin
, my cherub. Do not seek to protect that maidenhood we both know you no longer possess. Come here, my little cauliflower, do not be shy. I'll wager you have a pretty mouth and could suck
La Chute
dry.” He began to unbutton his breeches. “See what I have for you, my sweet.” And still she turned away. “See the gift I have brought you?” He searched inside his coarse spun cotton shirt and produced a five sol silver coin from a small leather pouch dangling against his chest.

“Five sol piece just for you, my temptress,” Turcotte said in a husky voice. “My but you are a tall one, come and drink with me and afterwards perhaps we shall go alone, you and I, and enjoy one another's company.” By heaven, she had a stride, this one. He envisioned her long legs wrapped about his waist. The fantasy spurred the freighter's efforts and he hurried to catch up to her. The effort left him out of breath. But determination and lust fueled his final steps. She was waiting, her back to him, standing abreast of the kegs. Good, at least he did not have to walk far to get drunk.

“Let me see you, my sweet, give us a look at what I am paying for.” He caught up with her and placed a hand on her shoulder and felt a surprisingly well-muscled torso beneath the chemise she wore.

“How's this?” the harlot replied in a deep voice and spun about.

Turcotte gasped and staggered back on his heels. “She” sported a dark growth of chin whiskers, sideburns, a thick, low brow and muscled chest. Sergeant Tom Strode, on loan to the Rangers by order of Major Ransom and assigned to learn the ways of these Indian fighters, hauled out a large-bore flintlock pistol from under the folds of his skirt, cocked the weapon and sighted down the barrel.

In an instant, the party of
voyageurs
was surrounded by Rangers in dyed green buckskins who materialized out of the undergrowth with their rifles leveled at Turcotte and his crew. A veritable mountain of a man strode forward and bowed, sweeping his Scottish bonnet across his powerful chest. A massive-looking dog trotted out and took up a position alongside the Ranger. The mastiff growled, the sound came from deep in the animal's chest, primal and menacing.

Turcotte gulped. He had heard of a man like this, from when he last traded among the Abenaki. A name leaped to mind. Johnny Stark? Yes, it had to be, look at the size of him. There were rumors Stark and his Rangers had intercepted war parties and struck at French patrols along Lake George, but he had never come up this far north. Lake Champlain with its chain of forts and Abenaki villages was considered well beyond his reach and uncontested territory.

Not anymore.

Turcotte shrank back from Stark and glanced about at the three “women,” only one of whom was
la femme
. Molly Page, who had called to the
voyageurs
from the shore, brandished a brace of small-bore yet lethal-looking pistols and even now held Claude Lanyon, her would-be paramour, at bay.

Poor Locksley Barlow appeared mortified to be dressed as a harlot. However, the bearded English sergeant who had caught Turcotte's fancy seemed somewhat resigned to his fate. Benoit Turcotte's shoulders sagged, and he was filled with genuine disgust at the way he had fallen for the trap. With a sigh and a shake of his head, the man swung about and searched Stark's icy gaze for a trace of mercy.

The towering figure softly uttered a command and the other Rangers immediately fell upon their captives and disarmed them. The mastiff continued to snarl as if the beast was daring the
voyageurs
to make a break for the lake.

“Welcome to
Corrette's La Chute, mes amis,”
Stark said, his voice cutting through the sweet cool air.

He did not say “friends” as if he meant it.

Stark hadn't been able to find a dress that fit him, for which he silently gave thanks. Or else his comrades at arms might have forced him to share in their embarrassment. He kept to the trees, in a grove off to the side of the growing collection of bateaux drawn up on the shore and watched in bemused silence as his men had their fun at the expense of Barlow and the British sergeant.

“By heaven, you lads is pretty as a paddock of newborn calves,” Moses Shoemaker cackled as he bowed courteously and doffed his tricorn. Locksley Barlow scowled as he tugged on the laces of his French bodice.

Molly Page arrived from hurrying down the footpath that led from the shadowy interior of the cave. “More boats are coming, m'ladies,” she exclaimed. The red-haired young woman stepped up to her recalcitrant “sisters,” Barlow and Strode, and helped them with their disguises, quickly adjusting their bonnets and tightening the laces on their bodices once more, being sure to emphasize the swell of the knotted cotton padding that gave the illusion that each man was a well-endowed woman.

“Blast it, Molly,” Locksley complained. “I cannot take a proper breath.”

“But can you dance?” she quipped and pinched his cheek. Molly glanced back toward the grove of red maple and caught Johnny Stark admiring her from afar. Realizing he had been discovered, Stark shifted his attention to the lake and pretended to study the distant flotilla of half a dozen bateaux approaching from the north, obviously another shipment bound for Fort Carillon. She curtsied and waved a kerchief that she kept tucked in her bodice between her breasts. Johnny sheepishly acknowledged by touching his Scottish bonnet and then disappeared through the afternoon shadows, up the slope toward the cave where better than thirty French crewmen and freighters had been bound and left to their own devices under the watchful glare of a single well-armed Ranger.

Locksley Barlow and Tom Strode continued to complain about their ordeal. They looked enviously at their friends, this company of Rangers all of whom wore garb similar to Johnny Stark's; a Scottish bonnet, buckskin shirt, deerskin moccasins, and breeches dyed a forest green, carrying their rifles and hatchets, powder and shot.

“God help me,” said Sergeant Tom Strode. The Englishman had been grudgingly accepted by the rest, after being posted to the Rangers. He would have preferred to be back at Fort Edward. But what was a soldier to do? Major Ransom had ordered him to observe the colonials and learn their skills in the event the major established the Regiment's own company of king's Rangers.

“If there's trouble and one of these bloody Frenchmen sends me under,” Strode said aloud for his companions to hear and take note, “I charge every man here to strip me naked and not plant me in these geegaws.”

“I dare say you would scare the angels into perdition dressed as you are,” Sam Oday drily commented, perched upon a log, wooden fife in hand. Oday, along with Robert Rogers and four other men, had donned some of the clothes they had taken off their captives. With a half-dozen shallow draft boats drawn up on the shore, the scene might look suspicious without some of the
voyageurs
milling about. Sam Oday and another of the company, a broad-beamed, corn-fed youth named Danny Dulin began to play a merry little tune upon their wooden flutes.

“I dare say, Mister Strode, if you want to gambol with me you might have plucked your chin whiskers,” Moses cackled. The old graybeard hopped about and danced a jig and tried to catch Strode by the arm but the sergeant pulled away. “Don't be shy, love, or you'll not receive a single ha'penny from this child.”

“Lay hand on me again, you old sot, and I'll gut you like a codfish,” Strode growled, slipping a hand to the hilt of a knife he kept within his lace-trimmed sleeve.

“Quit complaining and start tempting,” Robert Rogers hissed beneath his breath. He motioned for Shoemaker, Oday, and the rest of the disguised Rangers to join him around the campfire they'd built on the lakeshore. He called for them to sing and laugh and carry on as if they were drunk on rum and good fortune. “Come on, lads, we've just delivered our goods to Fort Carillon and come away with money in our pouches. And here's the ladies who will lighten us of our cares and our purses.” At a glance, they'd appear to be counterparts of the Frenchmen in the flotilla of boats slowly ascending the lake.