Sharon decided it was a good one. "If we can, Melissa, would you take charge of that convoy? I'll get with Captain Taggart and figure out how best to split the Marines. Having some of us staying until the last minute would be a good idea in any event. There might be people we need to get out who won't be ready to leave until we've got the Spanish breathing down our necks."
Melissa nodded. "Adolf was in the ballroom a few minutes ago, I'll go and find him and we'll get started. Come on, James, the sooner we start—"
Doctor Nichols was holding up his hand. "Actually, Melissa, I'll go with the second party. I'd guess that Captain Taggart is going to want to send most of his Marines with the first group, since they'll have the kids with them and move slowest. If we can, we should confine the stay-behind party to people who can handle a gun and move quickly. And if we're just ahead of the real trouble, I think we're going to need more trained medics with us. If Rita goes with you, she'll be enough medic for the advance group, and Tom can boss the Marines if the good captain stays with us."
Melissa chuckled. "So long as Tom doesn't get all macho and insist on staying with the rearguard."
"No, he won't. Unlike my daughter, who by rights should be going with the lead party, but will insist on standing her post until the last minute. I've got more sense than to try to persuade her otherwise."
Sharon snorted. "Enough. Let's get things moving. It'll be dawn in a few minutes."
They had a convoy of women and children and most of the baggage ready to go within an hour of dawn. The kids were chattering and running about the horses, in some cases still munching on the bread-and-cheese breakfast they had been given. Tom, who in truth had grumbled a little about being sent on, was on foot, having ceded his horse to two pregnant women. "I wish we could get the kids to line up and hold hands," he said, looking about.
Melissa smiled, gently. "It's not something they learn in grade school here. Besides, it'll do the Marines good to have kids to herd while we get outside the city. Keep 'em alert." Sharon had seen her eyes constantly flicking back and forth. The motion looked practiced, and Sharon guessed that Melissa had taken enough field trips in her time that keeping track of dozens of rambunctious youngsters at once had become second nature. Rita was in the middle of a small swarm of children—where did they all come from? We didn't have this many last night!—and was comforting a little girl who had already skinned her knee.
Tom had stationed most of the cavalrymen at the back of the column he had formed up in the street outside the embassy, on the theory that they could watch over the kids and herd them back in line if they strayed and their mothers didn't notice. Two of them already had kids riding up with them, which Sharon worried about a little if there was any trouble. Having to put a child down gently could slow them down. Still, the defense of the column had been bolstered by including the menfolk of the embassy staff with cudgels, knives and down-time muskets. They were mostly on foot and would be keeping the kids in line as well. For the time being, though, their attitude seemed to be that if the kids wanted to play, let 'em.
Tom waved it all aside. "Well, we've got what we've got. Anything else is going to have to come out with the rest of you."
"Or be burnt," Sharon said, thinking of the large pile of brushwood, broken-up furniture, classified documents and sprinkled gunpowder that was out back of the embassy awaiting a match to send it up. They were still finding things to go on that pile even now. "Whatever happens, we're not staying past noon."
"See you don't," Tom said, giving Sharon a few watts of his best commanding-officer glare.
With that, he bellowed the order to move out. The kids, to Sharon's surprise, fell into reasonable order quite quickly, and she guessed they would keep up the quick walking pace for quite a while. They didn't have the automobile to make them prone to get bored with a walk of any great length.
Sharon watched them down the street, and out of sight as they turned on to the Via Calabria to leave the city by the Porta Salaria. They had a rendezvous point at a village about ten miles away, which they should reach by sundown. The ten people left behind would make better time, of course, and in theory would overtake them on the road. If they didn't, Tom and Rita would have to take their best guess as to what to do. They had the radio crew with them, at least, so they would be able to consult with Magdeburg if they truly had to.
At least most of the people she was responsible for were out of harm's way. Adolf would be pleased that the final clear-up would be done with fifty or sixty fewer bodies underfoot. She was about to turn and go back inside and help when Ruy appeared, trotting his horse around the corner and coming back to the front door.