The Hanau garrison sounded the alarm immediately, leapt on their horses, and gave chase. They even managed the odd skirmish with the enemy, slowing them down and harrying them somewhat, but they failed to get any of the booty off them. They were a light squad, the Croats, very swift and mobile, and they made good progress – to Büdingen first, where they stopped to eat, handing over part of their prize (the captive sons of wealthy Hanau families) for the local citizens to ransom, trading the horses and other goods they’d stolen, then saddling up again, leaving Büdingen before dark (let alone before dawn), riding fast through the forest in the direction of Fulda, snatching what they could carry, never allowing looting and plundering to slow their rapid progress. They could match the devil, apparently – i.e. scarper and (begging your pardon) shit simultaneously, not missing a trick as they went. We reached Hirschfeld Abbey (where they were quartered) that same evening, bringing a substantial haul of booty. This was all shared out, with me going to Colonel Corpes.
Under my new master, I found everything strange and repellent. Gone were the delights of the Hanau table; we dined instead on coarse black bread and stringy beef or at best a scrap of stolen bacon. There was neither wine nor beer, only water. And rather than give me a bed they made me sleep with the horses, among the straw. Instead of strumming the lute, which normally everyone enjoyed, I and the other lads sometimes had to go crawling under the tables to howl like dogs as we took kicks from spurred boots, which for us was no fun at all. Back in Hanau I’d gone for walks; here all I got to go on was raiding parties, after which I had the pleasure of rubbing down and mucking out their sweaty horses. Anyway, raiding parties only meant putting a lot of time and effort, often at risk to life and limb, into giving the surrounding villages a good going over, bagging whatever one could, torturing and killing the menfolk and raping their wives, daughters and maids. And if the poor peasants were having none of it or made so bold as to give the odd forager a tap over the knuckles for his misdeeds (and such uninvited guests were common in Hesse at that time), they’d be cut down if caught or at least have their houses burnt to the ground. My master was unmarried (anyway, most soldiers of his rank never took their womenfolk along) and had no pageboys, no valet, and no cook. On the other hand, he did have a whole lot of grooms and young men to attend to both him and the horses, and he was not above saddling or foddering a steed with his own hands. He himself invariably kipped down in the straw or on the bare earth, pulling his fur cloak around him, so that you often saw fleas crawling over his clothes. Not that he was at all shamefaced about that; he’d even laugh when somebody picked one off. He had his hair cut short and wore a broad Swiss beard, which he found convenient because he liked to disguise himself in peasant garb for reconnaissance purposes. He kept a far from splendid table, as I say, but his men and others who knew him respected, loved and feared him nonetheless. We were constantly on the move, galloping this way and that, making sorties, coming under attack ourselves. It was all go. We never stopped trying to inflict damage on the Hessian forces; nor did Melander spare us, capturing many of our troopers and packing them off to Kassel.
This restless life certainly didn’t suit me, and I often (vainly, though) wished myself back in Hanau. My heaviest cross was not being able to speak to the fellows and having myself pushed around with nudges and thumps – by everyone, it seemed. The most fun I gave my colonel was by singing to him in German. Sometimes I and the other lads would puff out our cheeks and let him slap them to make farting noises. All right, that didn’t happen often, but the slapping tended to make the red stuff flow and I soon grew tired of that particular diversion. I did a bit of cooking from time to time – oh, and keeping my master’s gun clean; he was very keen on his gun. I was useless at raiding parties anyway, and offering these other services was a good move on my part. Little by little, I got into the colonel’s good books. In fact, he had a new fool’s costume made for me, again out of calfskin but with longer donkey’s ears than before. My master’s taste buds were never that sensitive, so cooking for him required no great skill. However, I was always running out of salt, dripping, herbs, one thing or another, and I began to find cooking a bore, too. More and more, day and night, my thoughts turned to a plan of escape – particularly with spring in the air. When it came to putting my plan into operation, I decided to start by shovelling up the remains of sheep and cattle that lay in such quantity around our quarters and getting rid of the awful stink. The colonel liked that, and little by little, going about my work, I stayed out longer and longer, until one night, as darkness fell, I didn’t go back at all but slipped away into the nearby forest.