Belle Morte Bites (Belle Morte 4.3)

The Woman in the Carriage: Part One

Guyenne, France, 1723

Hidden in a thicket of trees, his horse quiet and still beneath him, Ludovic de Vauban watched a carriage hurrying along the rutted dirt path some distance away, heading towards them, its wheels caked in mud.

A grin split Gustave's face, and he nudged Ludovic. "This is going to be a good one."

"How do you know?" Ludovic asked.

It had been three years since he had murdered his stepfather and fled the family home, disappearing into the French countryside. Three years since he'd fallen in with Gustave and his gang, and started eking out as a living as a thief, attacking carriages on the road and robbing their inhabitants. But his heart was never truly in it.

"Look at the windows," Gustave said.

Ludovic squinted at the carriage. It looked as though the windows were covered by black curtains, blocking any view of the interior.

"If they're hiding their faces, I'll they're important or recognisable, and that means rich."

Ludovic wasn't entirely convinced by that, but Gustave had a lot more experience than he did.

Gustave looked back at the rest of the gang – Alain, Paul, Benoit. All older than Ludovic, they'd been together for years, sometimes sleeping rough in the countryside, sometimes spending harsher nights in cheap lodging houses. Sometimes they robbed the lodging houses before moving on.

It wasn't the life Ludovic had ever imagined for himself.

It wasn't the life he wanted.

But he'd left home with nothing more than the clothes he'd been wearing, stained with mud and blood and thicker things he still didn't want to think about.

He'd never forgotten the way the iron poker felt in his hands, the sensation as it crunched into Maurice's skull. Generally, Gustave and his men didn't kill their victims – as long as those victims were cooperative.

Usually, they were.

Sometimes they weren't, and then blood was spilled.

Ludovic wouldn't be a part of that. He would not kill again, and to his surprise, Gustave had not pushed him to. The others teased him about it, and on occasion their teasing took a harder, crueller edge, but Ludovic never retaliated. He didn't always agree with their methods, but they'd taken him in when he'd had nothing. He might not have survived without them.

"This is a big one, boys" Gustave said, smiling gleefully. "I reckon this will last us through autumn and into next year."

The carriage drew closer to their hiding place, and unease curdled in Ludovic's gut. Something didn't feel right about this. His horse shifted, pawing the ground.

Ludovic caught Gustave's arm as the older man started to draw his prized flintlock pistol from his belt. It was a beautiful weapon, all shining, polished beech, the barrel decorated with delicate gold scrollwork; he'd had it for as long as Ludovic had known him, but he never knew where Gustave had got it. Some poor soul on the road, no doubt. Gustave rarely let anyone else touch it.

"Wait," he said.

"For what?" Gustave asked.

Ludovic scanned the carriage again. A driver sat at the front, whip in hand, but there was no footman on the hooded rear seat, and that feeling of unease intensified.

"They're rich enough to see us through till next spring, yet they travel with only one servant?" he said.

"That's the point," Gustave said. "They're trying to trick us into thinking they don't have anything worth stealing. But that's a Berline carriage, boy. That's worth something."