on any gun was dependent on two things: the power of the ammunition and the weight of the frame of the gun itself, as Joachim had carefully explained to her. And the first shot she took did, indeed, kick the butt of the rifle back hard into her shoulder. But since she was prepared for it, the muzzle rose only a fraction, and she was sighting in on the target again.
Within moments, Giselle was completely in love with this rifle. Her first shot would have been in the second ring from the center, if the sylphs hadn’t interfered. She had it properly sighted in within five shots, and needed very little assistance on the stationary targets from the sylphs, perhaps a nudge on one shot in six or seven. Soon the center of the target had no more paper in it, and had taken on the dull sheen of lead as bullet after bullet flattened on each other. She lost track of everything except the gun in her hands, the target in front of her, and what the air around her was doing. Even the kick of the rifle into her shoulder no longer registered with her, at least not consciously.
She needed no assistance at all when Captain Cody began tossing clay plates into the air.
Plate after plate went up and shattered as she shot, pausing only long enough to reload. Her hands worked of themselves, she really didn’t think about them. She could hardly have been unaware of the men’s growing excitement, since the Captain whooped with joy every time she hit her mark, but she kept her concentration on her targets. If the sylphs thought she needed to impress these men, then impress them she would! She swung the muzzle of the carbine, tracking each plate and snapping off a shot as soon as she was sure everything was perfect, her brows creased slightly. She was vaguely aware she’d probably have a bit of a bruise on her shoulder when she was done, but that was offset by the fact that this lovely carbine was so much lighter than her own piece.
The Captain paused in throwing up clay targets; perhaps his arm was getting tired. But there was still plenty of ammunition in the bucket they had brought her, and she decided that she was not through trying to impress them.
Although on the whole neither Joachim nor Pieter approved of what they would have called “boasting shots,” they still taught her several when she begged them. She looked at the Captain, fished in her pocket, and pulled out a pfennig. Inwardly, she winced at the waste of even one small coin, but then she reminded herself that if she could get supper out of these people, it would certainly be worth more than a pfennig. She mimed tossing it in the air and handed it to him. His eyes widened, but he nodded, pulled back his fist and flung it as hard as he could.
Of course, she was taking no chances; the sylphs assisted the trajectory of the pfennig as well as that of her bullet.
The Indian had sharper eyes than the rest of them, and strolled over to where it fell. He brought it back and the Captain let out a long, low whistle, when he saw she had punched a hole in it, slightly off of center.
If only I had a mirror, she thought, just a little smugly. I’d make their eyes bulge!
And as if the Indian had actually heard her thoughts, he reached into a bag he had slung over one shoulder and handed her a little ladies’ mirror.
If she had not read Karl May’s books, she would probably have been taken aback that he had such a thing—but she knew that Indians often used mirrors they got in trade for signaling each other at great distances. She took it with a smile and a little nod she hoped he recognized as thanks and turned her back on the target.
The trickiest thing about shooting backward, using a mirror, was setting the shot up and keeping the rifle steady once you had it sighted. When she had shot for Joachim and Pieter she had been scrupulous about not cheating using the sylphs. Now, however, she had no such compunctions.
With the hand holding the mirror firmly on the butt of the stock, and the other on top of the stock with her thumb on the trigger, she set the shot up, and gently squeezed . . .