As the barges carrying the Spaniards pulled slowly away from the wharf, Turlough Eubank returned from the cluster of Italian barges.
“What luck?” asked John.
“None, m’lord. Seems the barge master I spoke to is already waiting on a shipment of grain.”
“They could have a long wait.”
“No, sir. It’s a Tuscan ship, due here any hour.”
“And this barge master won’t take a few extra coin from us to change his plans?”
“He’s under Spanish contract, sir. Provisions for Rome, y’see.”
“Hell and be damned, is every bloody ship here under Spanish contract?”
Owen toed a bit of stray oakum with his boot. “Could well be, Johnnie. And if the rumors on our ship had even a passing acquaintance with the truth, Florence is sending down as much grain as the Spanish will buy. At regular rates.”
“So now Tuscany is Spain’s lap-dog, as well?”
“Maybe. Or maybe cheap Tuscan millet is the price the Spanish are demanding in exchange for another de Medici redcap.”
“So Borja’s selling cardinalships, now?”
“Ah, Johnnie, it would be strange if he didn’t. That’s how the game is played down here.”
“Well, the game stinks like a steaming melder, it does. Eubank, go check with the last barge. Maybe the Good Lord will smile on some honest Catholics, for a change.”
“As you say, m’lord. Oh, and Dr. Connal sent word: now that we’re on land again, he’ll be demonstrating the new pepperbox revolver while we wait.”
“Oh, he will, will he?” muttered John, who rose and stalked inland, where half of the men had gathered near a vacant farmhouse set back from the banks of the river. Suppressing a sigh, Owen followed along.
Five red roof tiles were propped up on a chest-high wall that paralleled the derelict farmhouse. Sean leveled the nose-heavy pistol and started firing. The reports were sharp and barely a second between each one. On all but the fourth shot, one of the tiles exploded into a shower of dust and fragments.
Although the range was only ten paces, Owen silently conceded that this was some pretty fair marksmanship. Particularly for a physician.
Apparently, John was not disposed to make the same concession. “I think you missed one, Doctor.” John had probably intended his tone to be droll, but it had verged over into smug.
Connal did not turn. Instead, his hands moved quickly, unseating the currently loaded cylinder, swapping in a fresh one from a leather chest-pouch of sorts. He locked it in place with a quick twist of a frontal knob, and expertly popped five percussion caps onto the cylinder’s five ignition ports (which, Owen had learned, the up-timers rather provocatively called “nipples”). The doctor thumbed back the hammer even as he raised the weapon, aimed, and fired.
The last tile vanished in a spray of pieces.
“My apologies about that straggler,” he said as he turned to face the earl of Tyrone. “I’ll be tidier next time.”
One or two grunts of amusement from the watching Wild Geese faded quickly enough when John sent an annoyed glance in their direction. “Not so fast reloading as you made it sound, Doctor.”
Connal nodded. “You can cut the time down by two-thirds if the percussion caps are already seated on the fresh cylinder. But carrying it that way can result in some misfires; the jostling can unseat or even ruin a cap. Not likely, but possible. Logically, it also creates a small chance of an accidental discharge while you’re carrying the cylinder on your person, but that would be quite a fluke.”
“And when did you learn to shoot like that, Doctor? Not while you were rehearsing the Hippocratic oath, I’ll wager. Indeed, if you shot much better, I’d have to suspect it was the hypocritic oath.”
There was a single, half-hearted snicker; the tone of the jest had been a bit more accusatory than it was jocular.
But Connal merely smiled. “Well, contrary to common belief, I was not destined to the medical arts from the crib onwards. Couldn’t figure what trade to follow for the longest time-not until I was, oh, at least two years old.” Smiles sprang up, as well as one stifled giggle. “Sad to say, but I was a late bloomer.” His concluding confession got a few outright laughs-and a darker look from John.
“So you thought you’d be soldiering, then?”
“As I said, I didn’t know. But when I was first at university in Leuven, Hugh-er, Lord O’Donnell, came to visit occasionally. Visiting the old alma mater, as it were. Taught me to shoot.”
“Why, of course he did. No doubt paid your way at the university, too, I’ll wager.”
“For the space of one semester, yes, he did.”
Which only made O’Neill’s face darken again, this time with a scowl. Johnnie didn’t like anyone allied with, or in service to O’Donnell much better than he did the “ sassenach ” Irish such as Preston. But his distaste for all things O’Donnell was in many ways the more embarrassing of his two prejudices: antipathy toward the “Old English” Irish had long, nationalistic roots. But his dislike of the O’Donnells stemmed from a much less noble trait: jealousy, plain and simple.
But John’s focus on the gun had apparently distracted him from his resentment. “So how does this eye- gouging piece of rubbish work, Doctor? I’ve seen one or two of these up-time revolvers. They’re all pretty complicated pieces of machinery.”
“This is much less so,” Connal explained. “The weapons to which you refer require exceptionally fine tolerances, since the cylinder holding the charge, or ‘cartridge,’ must align precisely with the weapon’s single barrel.”
O’Neill scowled. “But that thing has five barrels. All as one piece.”
“Exactly. This means that each of the chambers is designed exactly like a self-contained barrel and breech. They are arranged in a pentagram, as you see.”
“There you go: witchcraft for sure.”
“Hardly,” smiled Connal. “Just as with the up-time revolvers you’ve seen, when you pull back the weapon’s hammer-or, in this case, a larger crossbar-it rotates the cylinder.” He demonstrated; the weapon made a monstrous clacking sound as the cylinder turned. “The percussion cap of a new barrel has now moved into the position occupied by the last one. When the trigger is squeezed and the hammer falls, it ignites the charge in the new barrel. You can fire five times before reloading.”
Owen nodded. “But I’ve heard Dutch clockmakers complain that when they try to copy up-time devices like this, they can’t make the springs strong enough. How did you avoid that problem here?”
“The gunsmiths used larger, cruder springs, which led, in part, to the cumbersome size of the weapon. The only spring that still has a great deal of resistance upon it is the one that turns the cylinder. And if that breaks-” He manipulated a small knob protruding from the end of the cylinder, as if unlocking it, and then turned the entire unit by hand. “Still quite a lot faster than having to reload after every shot.”
John was clearly working at keeping the scowl on his face and his growing interest off. “Sure and it’s the seventh wonder of the world, Dr. Connal, but you’ll not get me to use one of these monstrosities.” But Owen knew otherwise: he could hear the reluctant fascination in the earl of Tyrone’s voice.
“That will be as you wish, Lord O’Neill. But you might wish to reconsider. The hammer is large and heavy so that a rider can manipulate it easily, even with a gauntlet on.”
“So that’s why it has a crossbar all the way across, rather than a single hammer?”
“Exactly. It’s easier to get a hold of. And given the springs used, it is easier to cock the weapon with a whole-hand pull on the crossbar.”
Owen considered carefully. “Yes, and it would also be useful if you’re trying to cock the weapon on horseback. You could even snag the bar on a saddle-hook and push the whole weapon downward to prime the action.”
“True enough, but there’s a more important advantage to the crossbar. Look at the vertical thumb tab at the center of the bar. What do you see?”
John squinted. “Hmmm. There’s a small hole, right where the tab and the bar meet.”
“Precisely. Just before it meets the crossbar, the vertical tab splits into two parts, rather like a Y standing on its head. The resulting triangle-the space between the arms of the upside-down Y and the top of the crossbar-is left
