A Close Run Thing (36 page)

Lankester could, only too well. But at Enghien, which they reached soon enough, they were not enlightened much. Indeed, they became
materially
confused, too, since a large part of the army seemed to be trying to push south and east through the town, guns and waggons blocking the roads as completely as ever the enemy could. Vivian’s orders, which now arrived by galloper, were to move on to Braine-le-Comte, twelve miles to the south-east astride the Mons–Brussels highway. It would have been an easy enough march under normal conditions, but the road was now jammed with traffic, the heat was intense and they were not able to water in the town. Even Hervey, who had ridden these roads often enough, knew of no easier way to Braine. There seemed no alternative but to push down the road, if such it could be called, taking to the fields when progress was altogether halted. In the event they did well to reach the town at four in the afternoon, but there was still no sign of Vivian.

By now the sound of gunfire was quite distinct, although from which direction it was uncertain. It seemed principally to be from the south-east, but at
other
times it seemed equally to be almost
due
east, towards Nivelles. Edmonds took a bold decision to alter their line of march, since gunfire due east (as he perceived the duke’s design from Hervey’s telling) threatened the worst. Scarcely had the Sixth got nosebags on their hot and hungry animals than Edmonds ordered ‘Mount’ to be sounded.

There was a sudden commotion in ‘A’ Troop. One of the horses, a fractious gelding that more than one rider had cursed as a rig, lashed out with both hind legs in the tight press and struck a mare in the rank behind. She squealed and threw her rider, who managed nevertheless to keep hold of the reins, and then stood quite still on three legs, the off-fore hanging uselessly like a rag arm. Her dragoon quickly recovered himself, took one look at the leg and saw that the cannon bone was shattered. Immediately, he primed his pistol and put it to her head, but he held it at too inclined an angle and with insufficient grip so that, when he fired, the ball scraped along the horse’s skull and off to a flank, striking another dragoon in the thigh. The pistol flew from the dragoon’s hand with the excessive recoil, breaking his wrist, and the flash and report sent the mare into a frenzy.

‘Jesus Christ!’ spat Serjeant Armstrong, springing from his own horse on to the startled mare’s neck. ‘Where’s the farrier, in God’s name!’

But the farrier was with the others at the back of the column, and still they could not calm the mare. Only a blanket over her head settled things. Hervey made his
way
through the press with his carbine as half a dozen dragoons got her down on her side and others made space. Seeing what must be done, he pushed a cartridge into the breech, put the muzzle in the fossa above her left eye and aimed at the base of the opposite ear – just as Daniel Coates had taught him. He pulled the trigger. The mare kicked out, twitched for a few seconds, and then lay still.

Armstrong began cursing all and sundry for their clumsiness before Captain Lankester rode up and took in the scene. ‘Very well, then, gentlemen, first blood to the French. Let us see to it that they have no more here.’

‘A’ Troop resumed the march subdued, sheepish almost. And an even more difficult march it was, since the road was no better now than a cart-track, though it led straight to Nivelles, and then beyond to Quatre-Bras. They could see nothing of the fighting, however, as they approached Quatre-Bras about eight, the sun setting behind them. The village, and the important crossroads from which it derived its name, was screened by dense woodland. But the noise, louder though not as intense as it had been in the afternoon, was unmistakable, and cannon shot flew over from time to time. Edmonds was relieved nevertheless. Hervey’s appreciation had been correct, for as they neared the trees he saw at last Major-General Sir Hussey Vivian.

‘Well done, Edmonds! I am sorely glad of seeing you,’ called his brigadier. ‘What a beginning! I am only
just
arrived myself. Come, we must find what we are to be about up there,’ he said, nodding in the direction of the village.

As Vivian and Edmonds entered Quatre-Bras they were met by one of Uxbridge’s gallopers in as great a composure as could be imagined. And his instructions astonished them further, for all that Uxbridge wanted was for them to bivouac in place, with just a field officer’s patrol out on the left flank to make contact with the Prussians.

‘The Sixth to take the patrol, then, please, Edmonds. I have still to collect the Germans from Nivelles somehow,’ said Sir Hussey, his hussars of the King’s German Legion having had a greater distance to march than even theirs.

Lankester made his rounds before taking the picket out. ‘What did I say at muster?’ he called here and there with a wry smile. ‘You shall not see your baggage this side of Brussels! Plenty of green fodder to cut, though. Put your backs into it, boys!’ Choosing a lieutenant for the patrol caused him no great thought: Hervey’s German and his familiarity with the country were singular.

Indeed, both skills were to prove inestimable since the moon was low and, though they probed all the way down the road almost as far as Ligny, they could make no contact whatever with the Prussians. Working their way back to Quatre-Bras soon after midnight, the moon having set, was even more perilous than the ride out: Lankester would later reckon it to be among the
most
hazardous essays of his life, and more than once Hervey’s German was the saving of them as nervous Dutch patrols beat about the country. At about three a Prussian hussar came into the outpost (which Lankester had finally settled one league from the crossroads) with intelligence of the Prussians’ battle around Ligny. After Hervey had questioned him (the hussar’s Brandenburg was the clearest German he had ever heard), he was escorted to Vivian’s headquarters in Quatre-Bras.

‘Ill news indeed,’ said Lankester when he was gone. ‘I had not expected to hear of such a reverse. Which way do you suppose the Prussians will retire?’

Hervey peered at his map by the light of the outpost’s fire. ‘Well, we must hope they
do
fall back on Wavre as they are meant to. Lord Fitzroy’s ADC says the duke has consummate trust in Prince Blücher. He says the old marshal would die in the saddle rather than not keep his word to him.’

‘And what will the duke do now?’

‘Well, I spoke before of the defensive position at Mont St-Jean. Like it or not, with the Prussians unable to hold the French at Ligny I do not see that he has any option but to fall back there – and let us hope that that is where the rest of the army is already making for. He
must
maintain contact with the Prussians, though. If he does not, then I doubt he is strong enough to hold even at Mont St-Jean, and then there’ll be the very devil of a fight in the forest behind. What I could not discern from that hussar was whether the
Prussians
have any fight left in them. If the French gave them such a drubbing that they cannot re-form, then even if they fall back in concert with us it will not be to any purpose. It looks forbiddingly as if Bonaparte may have achieved his first objective.’

‘My dear Hervey,’ said Lankester, holding out a flask of brandy, ‘you have a truly remarkable grasp of campaigning. There is not one officer in a hundred in this army who would have any notion of strategy beyond brigade drill – though in fairness they know that drill well enough. I hope with all sincerity that you will have a brevet out of all this – I for one will recommend it, though you know Edmonds will always anticipate me in that regard. But frankly, in this army, I feel sometimes that you would do better to capture some absurd French eagle!’

Hervey had never received praise from Lankester before. Curiously, it felt better even than the rare praise he had received from Edmonds. The master at Shrewsbury who had taught him his Greek, the gentlest of men whose academic interest in battles would have made him envious now of Hervey’s position, could have told him why: a Stoic’s praise was worthy, but a Corinthian’s was an inspiration.

A little sleep, in the few hours remaining before dawn, was all that Hervey was able to snatch, but it was satisfying enough. The outpost was called in soon afterwards, and they found the rest of the Sixth still in bivouac and making breakfast. That meal consisted of
nothing
more, however, than tea and biscuit from the troopers’ haversacks, there being neither sign nor news of the baggage train. Other than the periodic crack of a Baker rifle from a picket, its sharp report easily distinguishable from that of a musket or a carbine, there was silence from the direction of the previous day’s fighting. Rumour spread around the bivouac that the French had been decisively repulsed, that there would be a general advance and that the Sixth would be expected to lead it. Hervey was able to stop these fanciful ideas gaining too much of a hold, but it was a blow to them all none the less when orders came at about nine for a general withdrawal. The one mitigating detail was that their brigade was to cover the left flank. Hervey heard one of the younger troopers ask an older sweat if they would see any action there, and the sweat began to regale him with an account of Sahagun and the retreat across the Esla. Hervey remembered it well: it was more than apt – but God be praised that Slade had not command this time!

‘Nothing new under the sun, is there, Mr ’Ervey?’ Corporal Collins called as they took ground in front of General Picton’s division on the left. Hervey checked himself: Sahagun was one thing – yes, they had faced a superior number of French cavalry there – but this was quite another affair. Upwards of two corps of infantry, by his recall of the commander-in-chief’s assessment, with artillery
and
cavalry, were about to fall on them. He knew they had to buy time for the duke’s infantry to struggle back to Mont St-Jean, and
he
reckoned that they themselves would be lucky thereby to make the ridge as a regiment.

It was nothing less than astonishing, therefore, when they found themselves sitting for three hours awaiting the supposed onslaught – three hours in which the duke’s infantry and guns were able to march up one of the best roads in Europe to a defensive position which Hervey had thought one of the best he had seen. Was this really Bonaparte in the field? he wondered. Could it be a feint after all?

Captain Lankester rode along the front of the first squadron, Edmonds having ordered squadron-grouping for the withdrawal (a move that placed Hervey in field-command of ‘A’ Troop). Lankester exchanged the odd word with his troopers in a manner so matter-of-fact that Hervey could not but admire the accomplishment, as if the owner of some well-run estate were hailing his contented tenants on his morning ride: ‘I’m sorry, First Squadron – no breakfast, no rum, no Frenchmen, but I think we’ll have all of them aplenty and in good time, if not in that order!’ he called, to much laughter and cheering. ‘It could be worse, though!’

‘How’s that, sir?’ came a voice from the ranks.

‘Well,’ replied Lankester, wishing now that he had not said it, and trying to think of something, ‘it could be
raining
!’

Half an hour later it was. An apocalyptic clap of thunder, at almost the same instant that the French
guns
opened up, precipitated a torrential downpour which continued throughout their withdrawal to Mont St-Jean. But, rain or no rain, the withdrawal proceeded as a model exercise, conducted as if on a field day. The squadrons fronted repeatedly, the horse-artillery troop unlimbering and engaging each time in support. Then it would be ‘Guns, Cease firing; Out of action!’ and ‘Light Dragoons, Threes Right, at the trot, March!’ It was repeated once, twice, so
many
times that no one would remember precisely. Only once did they nearly come to grief, in Genappe when Third Squadron took a wrong turning, their captain unable to read his sodden map in the sheeting rain. Hervey, realizing the error, had galloped after them and brought them back on to the right road just in time for the horse artillery to deal with a squadron of
lanciers
pressing them hard. Even Barrow had been moved to remark on the address he had shown: ‘It is my opinion, sir,’ he exclaimed to Edmonds, shaking his head in disbelief as Third Squadron galloped back on to the
chaussée
, ‘that the Service can ill afford to lose such a man for want of promotion.’ It was the last place from which Hervey would have expected praise.

Thunder, lightning, rain in torrents and mud up to the fetlocks the instant a horse left the
pavée
: the conditions were a trial worthy of the most exacting reviewing-officer. But the enemy seemed unable to press to a decisive advantage. Three hours’ delay before resuming their advance! It was all Hervey could
think
of –
three hours
! What a difference that unaccountable failure was now making. It had been the duke’s deliverance no less! And dusk – earlier than the day before with so heavily overcast a sky – now began to envelop them in a blanket of safety as they reached Mont St-Jean, the lanterns of dozens of staff officers rallying the regiments to their collecting areas and thence to bivouacs near their battle positions. None of those officers could have expected the rearguard in such good order: soaked, exhausted, hungry – men
and
horses – but in formed bodies under perfect discipline.
Three hours!
What a price Bonaparte had paid already for that inexplicable stay. Had he not, himself, told his generals to ask of him anything but time? There was now a chance –
just
a chance!

XIV

A HARD POUNDING