A Shred of Honour (17 page)

‘That is another thing we’ll need to take care of. A musket is of little use if the flints are wet. And dust in the barrel is no friend to good shooting, which our lads are about to find out. I do not expect them to be happy about it.’

The truth of that remark, given the moaning that
followed
their arrival at the Picard warehouse, when the men were put to cleaning their weapons, was amply borne out. Rannoch was not to be moved. No-one ate until their musket was cleaned and inspected. Several were obliged to change their flints. Others were put to tightening up
the restraining screws on the firing locks as well as merely polishing them. Finally, at the very moment when Picard’s servants brought the steaming pots containing a handsome stew, Rannoch produced his tub of beeswax.

‘Now polish the wood, all of you. Make them gleam so you can see your face as clear as day. Then, and only then, you can eat.’

He managed to spend most of the night with Eveline, a pair whispering happily to each other in between their love-making. Her curiosity about his past was in sharp contrast to her own unwillingness to divulge much, but that didn’t bother Markham. He was happy to talk, to tell stories that made her laugh. But she did describe a life of some ease, in a Paris which, before the Revolution, hadn’t paid much heed to King Louis.

‘Versailles and the city were like two different
countries
. One stuffy and packed with idiots, the other alive.’

The word ‘alive’ moved her body in an enticing, uninhibited way that had him wondering once more about her previous liaisons. ‘Then tell me about it.’

‘Have you ever heard of a man called Beaumarchais?’

The question surprised him, since it was not what he’d expected. Not so much a change of subject as an acute tangent. Having mixed with many of the leading figures in the world of theatre, people who naturally had an interest in what happened in Paris and Vienna, he was no stranger to the name.

‘Who could fail to know the man who inspired a Mozart opera? He’s one of the few Gallic writers respected outside France.’

Eveline stiffened at that, and thumped his chest with her fist. ‘What about Molière and Racine?’

Since Eveline didn’t strike him as an erudite creature, that too engendered slight surprise. But it was fleeting, overborne by an uncomfortable sense of condescension,
made more acute by the silky way he avoided the second question by answering the first.

‘
The
Marriage
of
Figaro
. I heard it caused quite a stir.’

Eveline sat up, the light from the unshuttered window playing across her naked body, which made it hard for him to really listen to her words.

‘The King’s ministers wanted to ban it. But they were too afraid of the Parlement of Paris. Beaumarchais was such a rogue. He knew that a story in which a servant outwits his fool of a master was dangerous. There are those who say it led directly to the Bastille, which tickled his vanity.’

Her voice had a tone he recognised, one that hinted at familiarity, if not actual intimacy, Markham leant
forward
, nibbling at one of her nipples. ‘You sound as if you know him.’

She pulled his head up suddenly and kissed him hard.

‘Do you know him?’ he asked, when he was finally permitted to draw breath. He was again confounded by the way she avoided a direct answer.

‘We Rossignols always seek out amusing company, wherever we are. I thought you would know that by now.’

‘Does your sister know what you’re up to at night?’ he asked, pushing her away so that he could look into her eyes.

‘Pascalle?’ she replied, with a slight chuckle, twisting onto her knees. ‘Once in bed she hears nothing.’

‘And what about your father?’

That reduced her to a fit of giggling, which, given that she was being deliberately enigmatic, threw him into more confusion. But not enough to distract him from the attractions of her quivering body, which was now
straddling
him.

Markham was first up in the morning, awakened by the bright sunlight of a crisp autumn dawn. Normally a man to relish that soporific moment of waking in a warm bed,
he rose and dressed, eager to get to the range. Coming downstairs he saw Rossignol, fully dressed, crossing the hallway and heading for the Picards’ study, a sheaf of papers in his hand. The Frenchman stopped dead at the sound of his footsteps, and faced the stairs.

‘You’re as bright as the lark this morning, Lieutenant.’

‘I have work to do,’ Markham replied, wondering why his voice held a slightly apologetic tone.

Rossignol held up the papers, which appeared to be drawings of buildings rather than script. ‘So have I,
monsieur
, so have I. The doctors are with us once more.’

On ground level, Markham could see the door to the study was slightly open. The drift of suppressed voices came to his ears, one of them, he thought, female. But there was a male voice too, which stopped speaking long enough to emit a consumptive cough.

‘Besides that, Monsieur Picard and I are hard at it. He and I are as one, that we must not allow the war to deflect us from matters of business.’

Rossignol gave him a weary smile, meant to convey that while Markham had slept, he had not. Then he went through the door. As it swung shut he heard Picard’s voice begin speaking, only to be overborne, in the split second before it closed, by an insistent female voice. He made his way to the kitchen, finding that Celeste was up, and already engaged with the other servants in making the family breakfast. She fed him on fresh bread, a
conserve
of plums and strong coffee.

‘Are you comfortable here, Celeste?’ She shrugged, her sad eyes and lack of response killing off his attempt to engage in cheerful conversation. ‘Well if there’s anything you need, you can always ask.’

Once, he assumed, she’d been a bright, lively girl, whose long dark hair would have been used to frame a becoming smile. Not any more. Her cheeks looked more drawn than he remembered, the olive complexion wan rather than healthy. Too much time spent indoors
perhaps
,
since she never went out into the city. He suspected she still hadn’t recovered from what had happened in the back room of her father’s inn.

Going through to the warehouse he found Rannoch and the men up and making ready to depart. The
sergeant
had set the brazier, and the charcoal to heat it, ready to be carried. Beside it were two water buckets full of musket balls.

‘We will not get the rest of the casts until tomorrow at the very soonest, so I thought we could use some of the time up on the range to make the balls we need.’

‘Have the men been fed?’

‘We are taking rations with us. It will do no harm to have a day or two back on soldier’s commons, after the soft life they have been leading in this place.’

Markham felt a slight twinge of annoyance at that. Rannoch had issued that order without consulting him, which wasn’t strictly correct. But it would be churlish of him to stand on his dignity when the sergeant seemed so keen to oblige him in the matter of musketry.

The chill in the air, as they marched up through the steep slopes of the town, was very evident, a sign that even in these warm climes the nights were cold. When they arrived at the trenches, his men indulged in a great deal of foot-stamping and hand rubbing, accompanied by the usual moans of soldiers dragged away from a warm stove.

Schutte lit a fire which attracted them like moths, while Rannoch produced a fair quantity of musket balls. These, the product of his nocturnal labours, were laid out for inspection. Then he set off to check that the target was still at the correct distance while Markham ordered the men to breakfast. As they sat eating hard tack and dried beef, washed down with warm water laced with rum, he detailed the firing order. Strictly neutral as always, it was one Lobster followed by one Bullock. Rannoch returned, loaded his own musket, filled the firing pan with powder,
and handed it to Markham. The look he gave him made the words that followed superfluous.

‘Little point in asking men to do what you cannot do yourself.’

Markham jumped on to the firestep and leant forward, his elbow and forearm brushing the hard, cold ground. The smell of the weapon, a mixture of oil and wax, filled his nostrils. He was vaguely aware that behind him his men had stood up to observe, still clutching the canteens of mixed biscuit and salt pork in their hands. Rannoch’s mouth was close to his ear, the voice soft and almost caressing in the way that he issued his quiet instructions. As his hand came forward to touch the front of the weapon Markham saw the brand on his thumb,
something
which caused him to stop breathing. The letter ‘M’ was etched into the skin, a deeper red than the
surrounding
colour.

‘Take a firm grip with both hands, then turn them as if you were wringing out your smalls. As much pressure as you can both ways. Now pull the musket right back into the shoulder. Remember this is no sporting gun. When you pull the trigger it is going to come back and hurt you if it gets any chance to move. And the barrel is going to want to go up, so pull that front forearm down hard and aim the gun a wee bit low. The target is at one hundred and twenty paces, and you can fire when you like.’

The polished metal was cold against his cheek as Markham obeyed. But his mind was elsewhere. That mark on Rannoch’s thumb meant that he had been found guilty of manslaughter, that he’d killed someone in a fit of violence so great that he’d escaped hanging by a whisker.

‘You need to concentrate.’

The finger on the trigger, tugging hard, seemed to make no impression at all on the hanging hook of
gunmetal
. As he pulled, Rannoch spoke again. ‘Do not let
that hauling on the trigger upset any of your other hand positions.’

Markham realised that his grip, in all areas, had eased a fraction, and he sought to compensate. But that made the pulling of the trigger harder still. He could feel his hand getting stiff as the unaccustomed grip induced slight cramp. That brought forth a surge of effort. He was being watched. The idea that he might take his hand off the weapon and flex it was not, for him, an option. He concentrated on firing, putting to the back of his mind that brand on his sergeant’s thumb. The trigger eased back; Markham’s face was screwed up with the strain. But it passed the point he needed, and began to act on the arm of the flintlock. The hammer shot forward, striking a spark.

‘Eyes open!’ hissed Rannoch.

He did as he was ordered, saw the spark flash, then felt the blast of air and the singeing pain as the powder in the pan detonated. A streak of blinding light shot across his vision as the weapon fired. The brass butt slammed his shoulder back and the barrel, taking on an uncontrollable life of its own, started to lift. But the musket ball was gone before it shot in the air. Concentrating on
controlling
it, Markham didn’t see the wisp of straw fly off the top corner of the target bale. But Rannoch and the others did, and that produced a spontaneous murmur.

‘A splendid shot, Lieutenant,’ said an unfamiliar voice from the rear of the trench. Markham spun round as the man, a naval captain, crouched down. He had piercing blue eyes, a pale complexion, and a warm and engaging smile. ‘Nelson;
Agamemnon
.’

‘Sir,’ Markham replied.

Nelson pulled a large white handkerchief from his coat pocket and handed it to Markham. ‘I fear your hair is singed, Lieutenant. I’m surprised you can’t smell it.’

He rubbed at his cheek, which doused what remained of the singeing, wondering why Rannoch hadn’t given
him a piece of canvas to protect his face. Unfortunately, it also covered this captain’s handkerchief with the soot from the firing pan.

‘I’m afraid that I’ve rather done for your linen, sir.’

‘Never fear, Lieutenant …?’

‘Markham, sir.’

‘I’m having a look around the fortifications,’ said
Nelson
, standing upright. ‘Would you say they are sound?’

‘Sound enough, sir. Given the troops to hold them, that is.’

Nelson looked up at the top of Mont Faron, where a trace of the French outworks was just visible, a brooding reminder of the tactical prison they occupied. The smile that followed lost none of its warmth, but the voice had a wistful quality.

‘That’s the rub, Mr Markham,’ Nelson sighed. ‘Not enough men. Forgive me, Lieutenant, I am distracting you from your practice.’ He touched the rim of his hat and turned away, eyes still raised towards the hills, his arms behind his back as he walked along the rear of the trench. A blue-jacketed sailor, probably his coxswain, fell in behind him.

‘Right,’ shouted Markham. ‘Breakfast’s over. Let’s have the first of you lot on the step.’

‘That was good shooting,’ said Rannoch softly. Then, in a voice that made it sound as though it was dragged from the depth of his bowels, he added, ‘Sir.’

Tired, dirty and hungry, they marched back to the Picard House. There was a certain amount of jocularity, which for the first time crossed the divide between Lobster and Bullock. The shooting, individually then in teams, had given them a common source of scorn. Each bad shot was recalled, the perpetrator subjected to endless ribbing. Not all of it was being exchanged in the right spirit, but that it was happening at all was welcome.

As Markham crossed the courtyard, he encountered
Rossignol in conversation with the two doctors who’d been attending Jean-Baptiste. Judging by the looks on their faces, it wasn’t a pleasant experience for the two physicians. Rossignol, pacing up and down, speaking to them in a harsh tone, stopped both as Markham passed by. But he resumed as soon as he thought him out of earshot. Markham slowed his pace as he crossed the hall, his curiosity getting the better of him. Even if he couldn’t make out many of the words, he knew that the man who’d employed them was less than happy with the results of the doctors’ endeavours.

At the top of the stairs, Rossignol’s voice became an indistinct growl, whatever he was saying overborne by soft singing. Putting his ear to Jean-Baptiste’s door, he heard Celeste. He also heard the boy, his high-pitched voice very different from hers. He wasn’t in tune, but the words of the simple song were being enunciated quite clearly, much more so than he’d achieved with the doctors several weeks before.