Run Them Ashore (15 page)

Yet it was her mother who concerned her most, and then suddenly, as the clocks struck four in cruel reminder of how much sleep she was losing, Jane understood. The thought was clear and somehow she knew it must be true. Her parents had married in 1783, not long before Britain and the new United States of America concluded a peace treaty. Her father had been a prisoner of war, a young lieutenant, and he had escaped his captors alongside another officer. That man had brought with him her mother, then a little shy of her eighteenth birthday, and
daughter of a wealthy family, nearly all of whom were patriots fervent for the cause of independence. With the militia on their trail, the other officer had fled, and after several narrow escapes, her parents had managed to reach the British lines outside New York. By that time they were in love and had married as soon as a parson could be secured.

That was the bones of the story, as it had been told to her. In the last few years she had begun to question some of the details. Mrs MacAndrews had given birth to a son before the year was out, suspiciously soon after they had married. Her parents were always vague as to why she had chosen to leave with two escaping prisoners of war, talking airily of her taste for adventure. Eventually her mother admitted that she had fallen in love with the other British officer, but not to say anything about it to the major. Her father knew everything, and they had long ago ceased to worry about such things. Jane kept her promise and found that the changed story did not alter her attitude towards her parents, whose happiness was so obvious. Yet she wondered whether that first baby had been a half-brother.

Lord Turney must be the other officer, her mother’s lover and perhaps the father of the child. Jane felt that it must be true, and it explained so much. The title was clearly an Irish one, and no doubt inherited since then, so that she would not have recognised the name. Memories of dancing with the man rushed up and were disturbing. Not only was the man old enough to be her father, if things had been different he might have
been
her father. The closeness of his touch as he had pulled her hips towards him in the waltz now seemed uncomfortable indeed. She almost wished for another bath.

Jane must have fallen asleep in the end, for she woke to a bright strip of sunlight running across the ceiling.

‘You look quite unwell, Jane,’ her mother said as they took breakfast. ‘I fear some of the food last night was not of the best. However, I have news. I have decided not to follow your father to Gibraltar. It is likely the regiment will move, so we might only reach there to find him gone, and this is a more comfortable
place to stay than the Rock. Here you should not be frightened by apes,’ she added with a smile. ‘Do you remember that when you were a little girl?’

‘Yes, Mama. Of course, if you think it best, then we must stay,’ Jane said – and avoid further encounters with Lord Turney, let alone the prospect of being cooped up in a ship with him on the journey down.

Jane was sure that she had got to the heart of the mystery.

10

T
his time it all went smoothly. With Edward Pringle back on board, the
Sparrowhawk
took them again through the Straits of Gibraltar and landed them at night along the coast from Malaga. The winds were ideal, and when they went ashore no French cavalry stumbled across their path. Hanley, Williams, Dobson and Murphy were the only British soldiers. Pringle was not with them, having been sent to Gibraltar. By now he would be back with the battalion, at the head of the Grenadier Company, and no doubt drinking too much of the Gibraltar black-strap, wine infamous for being both cheap and very strong. Hanley knew Williams would have liked to be with him – not for the drink, of course, but to be back with the battalion – and that puzzled him a little since he knew that Mrs and Miss MacAndrews were still in Cadiz. Probably his friend’s sense of honour was screwing him up inside and making him feel noble for being away from the woman he loved. Hanley pitied Williams for the constant battle the man fought to match his own ideals, and rather envied him because he had fallen so deeply in love with one woman. Such closeness was not something he had ever felt.

With the British came a Spanish lieutenant, two soldiers, fifty muskets – this time Spanish models begged from the army at Cadiz – two thousand cartridges to go with them, thirty short swords, and six barrels of powder. Lieutenant Vega was from the area, and had arranged everything. Mules and guides were waiting, and they moved inland swiftly. El Blanco’s band was one of the first they visited, giving him half of their supplies.

‘Better,’ the chieftain said, smiling this time when he looked at one of the muskets. ‘Much better.’

Their welcome was warm from the start, probably because they did not have Sinclair with them, and the next morning they all rode to a high peak and looked down towards the coast.

‘The French hold their forts,’ Don Antonio Velasco told them. About a mile away they saw a group of high-walled buildings on top of a lower crest. ‘That was the Convent of Santa Clara. Now it holds one hundred soldiers – Germans who serve the French.’

Don Antonio’s wife rode beside him, dressed all in black – boots, trousers, shirt, cloak and even her broad-brimmed hat. Hanley had told Williams about the women who rode in the band, but the Welshman had still made the same mistake as he and Pringle, at first taking them for boys.

‘You were right not to let Lupe come,’ the leader said to his wife, who made no reply. ‘She used to live there, like many girls when they come of age, waiting for marriage.’

‘An unhappy memory?’ Hanley asked.

‘There was a French column going along the valley,’ El Blanco said. ‘This would be back in January. Shots were fired, who knows from where, and so the French stormed Santa Clara.’

‘Poor child,’ Williams said in his slow Spanish. ‘Was she hurt?’

‘She was violated.’ It was Paula Velasco who spoke, and her voice was surprisingly deep. ‘Again and again. So were the nuns, and many were killed. And so she is seventeen and no longer a child. She says little and only hates and kills.’

Hanley had heard many such stories in the past years, so much so that the mind became hardened, but the young woman’s tone was so brutal that he felt again the terrible sorrow of this war. When he thought of such things it sickened him to remember how he had once admired Napoleon as a bringer of enlightenment. Yet French officers seemed so affable when he met them, brave and chivalrous. Were there others, some different breed he had not met, capable of such appalling savagery?

‘We all hate.’ El Blanco’s voice was harsh. ‘We have good reason to hate. I would slit the throat of all one hundred men
up there as soon as I would clean dirt off a boot, and with less feeling. But …’ He waved his hand at the distant convent and his voice trailed off.

‘But,’ he continued after a while, ‘we cannot get at them in their forts. If I led my men to attack Santa Clara then they would be shot down. If I raised a thousand crusaders from the mountains and took them with me then most of them would die in the attack and still we would achieve nothing. Without cannon we cannot pierce their walls and so they are safe. I cannot starve them out because in time a column will come and no matter how many we are we cannot stand against a French regiment in open country. We can harry them in the passes, hold them for a while, but they will get through and then we must run or die.

‘I cannot stop them from going wherever they will and I cannot take their forts. Not even if I led all the guerrilleros for a hundred miles and all the peasants could I do these things.’ He sounded bleak now. ‘I can hurt them a little, kill a few and make the rest nervous in the night, but I cannot beat them. For that we need an army, a proper Spanish army, with guns and cavalry.’

‘If a force comes, will you help it?’ Lieutenant Vega asked.

‘Of course. We will do everything we can. The people will rise if they have a chance.’

‘And do you think the other bands of guerrilleros will do the same?’ Hanley said.

‘All the ones worth having will come. We have not seen Spanish soldiers for a long time.’ Don Antonio gave a wry smile. ‘Even a few of you heathen English would be welcome.’

‘Good, then for the moment you must show us more of the country and tell us all you know about the enemy’s dispositions.’

They rode on, and saw more French outposts, a mixture of converted buildings such as churches and monasteries, and freshly dug earth and timber structures, usually with a high central tower surrounded by a rectangle of wooden walls. None of the garrisons was very big.

‘Their main forces stay in the towns,’ Don Antonio told them. ‘They move around a lot. We can at least make them do that by
threatening their outposts and making them march to the rescue. If nothing else, at least we shall wear out their boots!’

Other guerrilla chiefs said much the same thing. The French were kept busy and were spread out in garrisons or mobile columns. Everything Hanley saw confirmed Major Sinclair’s reports, save that the partisans did not seem to think the foreign allies stationed in the area were of such low quality. Malaga’s defences were certainly weak.

‘Of course they are, man,’ Sinclair assured him when they encountered the major around the campfire of another band, a few days later. ‘It’s a plum ready to fall.’ The Irishman was pleased when Hanley told him to write a list of the aid he needed and where he would like it delivered, and even more excited to hear that there was a serious prospect of an expedition in the next few weeks.

He was also still convinced of the low quality of most of the troops in the area. ‘Look, the irregulars are brave fellows, but to them all soldiers look the same. These Germans and Poles hate it here. They’re stuck in garrisons and murdered if they stray alone outside, and all this for an emperor who doesn’t give a damn about them and shows it. Why, a good quarter of El Lobo’s band are deserters – Swiss, Italians, Germans, Poles, and God knows what else. There are some with nearly every leader.’

Hanley had to admit that was true. El Blanco and a few others led only Spaniards, but in several bands he had seen such men, usually silent and often grim. They had fled from their regiments, and tended to fight with the desperation you would expect from men whose only alternative was the firing squad.

On the last day they looked at one more French outpost.

‘Moorish work, I do believe,’ Williams said, as he studied the sand-coloured fort overlooking the sea.

‘Undoubtedly,’ Hanley said after he had taken a turn with his friend’s telescope. ‘Three guns by the look of it.’

‘That is Sohail Castle,’ Vega informed them, and smiled. ‘I was born in the village near it. It is called Fuengirola.’

Two hours after sunset they showed a lantern from the beach,
and
Sparrowhawk
’s gig pulled through the surf to take them off. Hanley was well pleased by the success of the mission, encouraged by the spirit of the guerrilleros and the quality of the information they had supplied. Yet most of all it was the ease of it. For five days they had ridden almost at will through land occupied by the enemy. They had seen plenty of little French outposts, but only twice had they seen cavalry patrols, and in each case only from a distance. El Blanco had teased one group of dragoons, running away, and then appearing again in plain sight, always just out of reach. For two hours the horsemen in their brass helmets and green jackets had followed. No shots were fired, for the enemy never came within range, but it was a fine display of cunning and easy familiarity with the ground. Don Antonio’s Andalusian horse had not even broken into a sweat.

This coast was vulnerable, Hanley was sure of it, and said as much to Williams as the boat pulled them across to the brig.

‘Very well,’ he said with an air of exasperation, after his friend did no more than grunt and rub a deep gouge on the side of the boat. ‘You tell me what I have missed?’

‘I am not privy to the councils of the mighty, so I may be the one who does not see clearly.’

Hanley pressed him. ‘Come on, Bills. Something is worrying that fat head of yours and I would like to know what it is.’

‘I do not believe that the enemy are demoralised,’ Williams said. ‘From what I have seen of them, Napoleon’s allies fight as hard as the French.’

‘Well, others have similar doubts, but that does not alter the fact that their garrisons are widely dispersed. They are vulnerable,’ Hanley insisted.

‘Yes, the enemy is not prepared to meet an attack from the sea. The opportunity you speak of exists. Yet from the little you have said, I am puzzled as to what such an attack is meant to achieve. Are we to hit for the sake of it or with clear purpose?’

It was a question Hanley dared to ask a few days later when he was back in the stateroom of the
Milford
in conference with the admiral and his chaplain.

‘The wisdom of a lieutenant.’ Sir Richard Keats chuckled to himself. ‘Ah yes, Williams of your regiment. Do you know General Graham himself mentioned the fellow to me quite specifically? Think of that. It seems this subaltern has caught his eye and so he asks me “not to steal promising officers from the army without good reason”. The impudence of the man.’ The admiral chuckled again. ‘Yet your lieutenant has asked a most pertinent question.’

Sir Richard paced over to stare out of the stern window. There were distant pops from near the French-held shore as some of his gunboats engaged their French counterparts. ‘They’re damned lively today,’ he said. Hanley and Wharton waited in silence.

‘Malaga,’ Sir Richard said at last, still staring from the windows. ‘If we can take Malaga and hold it then not only will we deny the privateers a base, but it will be a thorn in the French side. They will have to concentrate troops to mask it and keep them there, and even then will not be able to stop us raiding and supplying the irregulars. If thousands of their soldiers are tied down watching Malaga, then it will make it harder for them to bring their full force against Cadiz, and harder too for them to support the assault on Portugal.’

The admiral nodded. ‘Yes, if we can do that then it will be well worthwhile.’

‘You do not sound sanguine, Sir Richard,’ Wharton ventured.

‘Well, it may work. But the truth is that Campbell dreamed up this idea, the Spanish want it, and there are times when it is better simply to try anything than to do nothing.’ General Campbell was the governor of Gibraltar. ‘I would prefer Graham to be in charge, but he has plenty to keep him busy securing Cadiz. The Regency Council had done next to nothing to prepare for the siege. Indeed, had it not been for the initiative of one Spanish general who came here against his orders, then the place would have fallen to the French and the war in this part of the world would be over – maybe the war in the whole country.’

‘The Duke of Alburquerque,’ Wharton explained.

‘Yes, I have had the honour of meeting him. He impressed me greatly,’ Hanley said. ‘But I did not know he was in Cadiz.’

The admiral snorted in disgust. ‘He’s not, not any more. The fellow saves Spain, saves her government anyway, and then gets torn to shreds in the newspapers. Always plenty of rivals for a successful man, and they weren’t going to let him show judgement as good as that and take the credit for it. He is now ambassador in London, if you’ll believe it! While we have to deal with bloody-minded clowns like Blake and old women like La Peña! It is enough to make a man weep.’

‘Lord Turney will lead the expedition itself,’ Wharton said.

‘He may be up to it. I cannot say I care for the man, but he has a good deal of experience.’ Sir Richard glanced sharply at Hanley, no doubt with regret at expressing his opinion before so junior an officer.

‘Yes, he may do well, and this could prove a great stroke. Malaga would be a prize.’ Sir Richard came back from the window. ‘Now then, what does that remind me of ?’

‘The
Liberté
, Sir Richard,’ Wharton said.

‘Of course, of course. I think it important you know, although you must not speak of it. That boat your friend Williams helped cut out – here is the damn fellow again intruding everywhere. Well, she was more important than she looked, for she was carrying more than bales of cotton.’

‘Gold, Hanley.’ Wharton enjoyed revealing the secret. ‘Six chests full of gold coin. And a senior French officer, although sadly your friend and the other boarders cut him about so much that he has been in no position to talk.’

‘Pay for the army?’ Hanley suggested.

Wharton looked dubious. ‘Maybe, maybe not. It would seem odd to risk sending that by sea. No, that suggests they needed the money quickly – perhaps to buy support?’

‘The Frogs are up to something,’ Sir Richard cut in, ‘so we must cut across their bows and rake them before they can do it. We can start by taking Malaga, and you can help Lord Turney do it – you and that friend of yours. Promising officer indeed!
I am sure General Graham would be happier if the two of you do not get killed in the process.’

‘That is kind of the general,’ Hanley said.