by Iain Gale
‘Unthinkable.’
Keane looked across to where Somerset was reuniting General Philipon with his wife and two daughters. He smiled and, leaving the two most recent additions to his command on sentry at the door, went in search of Sergeant Ross.
Silver had done well to do what he had. Brute force was the only language that men such as O’Gara understood, and Silver had seen exactly where the situation had been leading. Keane would have expected nothing less from him, or from any of the men he now counted as not only his soldiers but his friends.
He climbed the staircase of the house and, standing at an open window looked down, into the street below. The place was alive with redcoats. But they were no longer soldiers. The army had lost its command and was transformed into no more than a mob. As he looked on, a group of redcoats broke down the door of a house, went inside and returned laden with bottles, two of which fell to smash on the cobbles. A third man emerged, dragging with him a young woman who was screaming and hitting him. He turned and slapped her face and she stopped and searched with desperate eyes for a saviour. But Keane could do nothing. He knew that to draw attention to themselves would only be to invite disaster. So he watched as the girl was dragged away by the redcoats and as two men, one in French uniform, the other a civilian, were bludgeoned to death in the gutter. Martin was at his side.
‘I could shoot their leaders, sir, easily, if you tell me who they are. That might stop them.’
‘Nothing’s going to stop them, Will. And that would just turn them on us. You can’t stop an army that’s this much out of control. All you can do is hope that it burns itself out. They’ve taken enough in this place and now they’re paying it back. And it doesn’t matter to them who they’re hurting – French, Portuguese, their own kind. They’re all just as guilty in their eyes. Just as much to blame for what they’ve gone through. What they’ve seen. They need to get rid of their pain.’
‘But, sir, look at what they’re doing. There must be something we can do.’
‘There’s nothing that can be done, Will. All we can do is wait.’
But the rioting did not stop. It went on all night and into the following day. And the longer it continued, the more concerned Keane became that at some stage, sooner or later, Sergeant O’Gara would reappear, and he knew that next time it might not end so well.
2
Keane was out of sorts. Between them a bunch of French-women, a mob of mutinous redcoats and a staff officer over-anxious to cover himself in glory had ruined his rare chance of seeing real soldiering. Yes, they had found Hulot and succeeded in getting him out of the city, against the odds, and he should have been pleased. But that was far from the case.
Silver noticed his mood, ‘Something up, sir?’
‘You might say that, Silver. Yes, something’s up. What do you reckon to this business?’
‘Sir?’
‘This work we do.’
‘You say it yourself, sir. It’s vital work, vital for victory. We take our orders from Nosey himself, sir, sorry, Lord Wellington, don’t we? Must be important if it comes from him. That’s how I feel about it, sir.’
‘But don’t you miss it? Real soldiering. The sort of thing we did, might have done, last night?’
‘Don’t know, sir. We see enough Frenchies, and I’d rather be with you and the lads dodging around than forced to stand stock still in a line and wait for a round-shot to blow off my head.’
Keane laughed. ‘I dare say you’re right. If it’s odds you are looking at, they’re on our side rather than the poor buggers in the front line. I just can’t help thinking, is this really what I joined for?’
‘Why did you join, sir? You’ve never told us that.’
Keane said nothing for a while and then, ‘It’s not simple, Silver. It has to do with family and duty and something someone did for me once. And a notion that was put in my head.’
They were standing, with the rest of the men a short distance away, outside the building in the fort of San Cristobal which Wellington had taken as his headquarters. In fact it was the same building to which General Philipon and his staff had fled the previous day and where Somerset had found them. But now it was filled with red-coated officers, and having turned over Colonel Hulot to his superiors, Keane waited to be summoned.
*
At length he was shown in. The tall room, the great hall of the fortress, was crowded with red-coated staff officers and a few Portuguese. Wellington was standing, looking grave, in conversation with a number of staff officers, two of whom Keane recognized as Sir Thomas Picton and Sir James Leith. Their conversation was animated and anxious. Another officer approached him from across the room.
‘James, good to see you. I heard that you were in the thick of it last night.’
‘Only obeying our orders, sir, nothing more.’ Keane smiled.
The new officer was Major Colquhoun Grant, Keane’s closest contact on the staff, Wellington’s senior intelligence officer and his own direct superior. He smiled at Keane. ‘Well, welcome back.’
‘Thank you, sir.’ He nodded across to Wellington. ‘I imagine that they’re discussing last night.’
‘Yes, it’s a bad business. Damned bad. I’ve never seen it worse. Not just one regiment, James, or even one brigade, but the whole army near as dammit. Only had the guards and the cavalry to control it. In the end we had to leave them to it. Nothing we could do.’
‘At least we managed to get the general out and his staff. Not to mention their ladies.’
‘Yes, and a few others, but God alone knows what happened to those left behind.’
Wellington had raised his voice now. It was not something that Keane had witnessed often. ‘Well, God knows what will happen to the miscreants. We only just escaped with our lives.’
‘Oh yes, Wellington has decided on that. There’s nothing to be done with most of them. How can you flog or hang an entire army? He’s going to hang a few to make an example, and have a few of the ringleaders beaten, if we can find them, and that will be that.’
‘Apart from the misery of those who suffered.’ Keane thought of the face of the Irish sergeant, filled with hatred. ‘I could name you one man who needs to feel the end of the hangman’s rope.’
‘If you can name him, if he has any sense he won’t have rested his heels for long.’
Keane nodded. ‘I suppose you’re right, sir. I imagine we’ll lose a few men that way.’
‘Oh, I dare say that some will run. But they’ll be caught eventually by the provosts. Or die at the hands of the French more likely – or the guerrillas. No one likes a deserter, James.’
The door opened and Colonel Hulot entered, accompanied by another British staff officer. Grant greeted him warmly. ‘Colonel, I trust that you are recovered?
‘Keane, I thought that it might benefit you to hear the colonel’s intelligence directly from him, so we are all in agreement. Colonel?’
Colonel Hulot looked at Keane and began to speak. ‘Captain, you will have realized, that I am no longer a follower of Bonaparte.’
It was strange to hear a Frenchman, an officer at that, talk of Napoleon as anything other than ‘the emperor’.
Hulot continued. ‘For too long he has ruled my country. He has sacrificed its sons on the altar of his ambition, and look where we are. His greed knows no limits. Spain will be the death of him. Already it is sucking away our lifeblood. I have seen some terrible things here, captain, Your Grace. Terrible things done to my men and terrible things done by them also, in the name of our glorious emperor.’
He paused. ‘I cannot let it continue. That is why I have given myself to you. I am a royalist at heart. My family met their end at the guillotine. I myself fled to Switzerland, and when the time was right I returned and joined the army. I am a good soldier, and Bonaparte rewards good soldiers. So here I am. I want to live to see the king bac
k on the throne of France.’
Wellington had extricated himself from his conversation and had been listening to the colonel. Now he nodded.
‘And I am not alone.’
Keane was now interested. ‘Sir?’
‘There are others like me who would bring down the tyrant. They tried twice, once in 1800 and once 1804. But both times they failed. Now there are more of us and we must succeed.’
Keane spoke. ‘You mean to start a plot against Napoleon?’
‘Yes, but not just a plot, a military coup. This madness must end now.’
Wellington took over. ‘What Colonel Hulot has told us, Keane, is that there is a movement in the French army which, if provided with enough support and under the right leadership, would be in a position to take power. If not immediately, at least to undermine the army from the inside while we attack it in battle.’ He turned to the man on his left. ‘Major Grant?’
‘Yes, we’ve known about the existence of a few cells of counter-Bonapartist insurgency in the French army for some time now, but we’ve never had firm enough leads to penetrate them. Colonel Hulot is the vital link we have been waiting for.’
At last another figure stepped forward. Keane had been expecting this.
Colonel Cavanagh smiled at Hulot. ‘Yes, this is all the most tremendous news. Well done, Captain Keane. It is precisely as I predicted, is it not, Your Grace? Here we have the evidence that the Prince Regent himself proposed: that the French soldiery have had enough of Bonaparte and are ready to rise against him. All that we need to do now is to go to their aid.’
Wellington looked at Cavanagh with barely disguised disdain, ‘It may not be so cut and dried, colonel. Such things hang in the balance and we do not yet know the full extent of this anti-Bonapartism. I have no reason at all to doubt Colonel Hulot’s intelligence, nor indeed his own sentiments. But surely we must first ascertain the depth of feeling in the army.’
‘As you will, Your Grace, but if you want my opinion, and indeed that of my masters in London and the prince himself, we have no time to lose. We should strike at the centre of Napoleon’s command in Spain while the iron is still hot.’
Grant spoke. ‘So, colonel, what would you propose we do?’
‘I would get a man in there. Inside the French army. Why, Captain Keane here would be just the man. Once inside he would be able to gauge the sentiment and then advise us on how best to exploit it.’
Wellington smiled. ‘Yes, Cavanagh, that sounds like an admirable idea. Eh, Keane?’
Keane stared at Wellington. ‘My lord, with all due respect, isn’t it a little foolhardy? What chance might it have of success?’
‘Oh, I should think at least fifty per cent, wouldn’t you say so, Grant?’
‘Yes, sir, about that, I should say.’
Cavanagh spoke, smiling at Keane. ‘Captain Keane, it sounds almost as if you might be reluctant to take on such a role. Surely not? I have heard that you are fearless. Can you really be afraid?’
‘Not afraid, colonel, merely sensible to the fact that there are calculated risks and those which might be simply unworkable.’
‘And you are telling me that my plan, the Prince Regent’s own plan, is not “workable”. Are you quite sure that is what you intended to say, captain?’
‘Not at all, sir. I approve of your plan. I am merely attempting to be prudent.’
Wellington spoke. ‘Well then, it’s decided. Captain Keane will infiltrate Marshal Marmont’s staff at our earliest opportunity and will observe the extent of royalist sentiment therein, reporting back to us before we take further action.’
Grant nodded. ‘That would seem appropriate, Your Grace.’
Keane stared at him. How on earth could Wellington and Grant, the two men in whom he had placed his trust these past three years, possibly be suggesting such a suicidal course of action based on a hare-brained plan put forward by an officer whom all three of them considered incompetent and merely the fop of the Prince Regent, who himself was merely indulging a whim to play at war? It was beyond comprehension. It was clear though that any protest would only incite Cavanagh again to cries of cowardice. Keane merely nodded and agreed in turn.
Cavanagh grinned. ‘Splendid. I shall send word to the prince. He will be delighted. Good day, Your Grace, gentlemen.’
He turned, walked to the door and left the room. As soon as it had closed behind him Wellington shook his head and looked at Grant. ‘Explain, Grant, if you would.’
Grant walked across to Keane. ‘My dear James, I can see that you’re wondering what the devil’s going on and well you might. Have we, you are thinking, taken leave of our senses? The answer, I’m pleased to say, is no. What we might say to Colonel Cavanagh and what we might think are two entirely different things and we would no more send you into the French army than off to the moon.’
Keane sighed with relief. ‘Then thank God, sir. I truly thought that you had lost your mind. It is surely the most ridiculous scheme. Certainly we must nurture any royalist spirit there might be, but to send in a British officer, any officer, would be suicide.’
Grant nodded. ‘Yes, James, it is a ridiculous scheme, but don’t become too complacent. We’ve another task for you.’
Keane sighed. This came as no great surprise to him. Both Wellington and Grant were old hands in coming up with extraordinary tasks for him, schemes that in effect often rivalled the absurdity of that which they had all three just dismissed.
‘Really, sir? How very intriguing.’
Grant laughed. ‘Don’t be funny, James. We know you too well. You’re wondering what new torture we’ve concocted for you. You thought that you had escaped the maddest plan in Christendom and find that you’ve dropped straight into the fire.’
‘Yes, sir, you could put it that way.’
‘I’ll be plain then. We too have a plan by which we can harness the anti-Bonapartist feeling that is undoubtedly brewing in France.’
Wellington took over. ‘My agents across Europe, Keane, and those who report to Lord Bute have been sending back intelligence for some time affirming that throughout the empire movements are stirring which intend to bring it down. It is our purpose to harness those forces.’
‘This sounds uncannily like the scheme of which Colonel Cavanagh was just speaking.’
Wellington shook his head, ‘No, no. You could not be more mistaken, Keane. It’s quite different. Far more subtle.’
Grant explained. ‘We want you to take two of your men and ride into enemy territory.’
Keane smiled. This was nothing new, merely the everyday round of being an observing officer.
‘Then we want you to get yourselves captured.’
‘Sir?’
‘You heard aright. You must arrange it so that you are all taken prisoner by the French. You know that they know a great deal about you, James. There is a price on your head. Not, I’m happy to say dead or alive, as yet at least, but any man who brings you in as his prisoner will get 20,000 francs.’
Keane shrugged. ‘I knew that there was a reward, but that’s pretty good.’
‘You’re valuable to them, Keane. In fact you’ve become something of a legend.’
‘And once we’re captured, sir?’
‘Then you somehow manage to make your way to Paris. It’s my guess that you will be sent there in any case. There are people there who would kill to talk to you. In Paris, or before if you can manage it, you must escape.’
‘Break my parole? That’s hardly the honourable thing to do.’
Wellington spoke. ‘You, Keane, know, better than many others, that this war is no longer about honour. It’s a game of sauve qui peut. Yes, break your parole. You have my blessing, if that’s what it takes.’
‘Thank you, sir. And once we arrive in Paris?’
‘You will make your way to our agent there who
will provide you with a new identity, a safe address and money to finance your stay.’
‘Our stay?’
‘It is our intention that you should remain in Paris for some time. You will have two areas of operation. Firstly we need to know what Bonaparte is planning. It’s clear that something’s up. He has been for some months now. He seems to be mobilizing a large army and we need to know where exactly it’s making for. Secondly though, we need you to find out the level of support for the anti-Bonaparte factions. We believe there are cells of Frenchmen who have it in their mind to rise up against him.’
‘This does seem not unlike Colonel Cavanagh’s plan with the army, sir. I really have to protest, Your Grace. I cannot leave my men. I am a soldier, sir. I must be here, on the ground, close to the fighting, with the army. Not hiding in the stinking back alleyways of a French city. Your Grace surely has other agents who are better suited to such a role. It is not in my nature. I am not a spy, sir. I am an officer.’
Wellington turned on him. ‘You are exactly what I choose to make you, Captain Keane. And if I say you are a spy, then that is what you will be. In point of fact, that is what you have been these past three years. I have no concern with your trials of conscience over what might be honourable behaviour, nor with your attachment to your men. I require you to travel to Paris and undertake this mission. Should you succeed, I will be only to happy to discuss your prospects, promotion even. But for the present I must order you to put this plan into action, whatever you think of it. And it had better work.’
As Wellington turned away from them, Keane, regretting what he had said, spoke. ‘I assure you, Your Grace, that I shall do everything in my power to ensure that it does.’
As Wellington ignored him and walked away from them, Grant carried on. ‘It’s true, James. It is different from Colonel Cavanagh’s plan. And that’s the point. This plan is far more ambitious. Far more daring.’
‘More daring than putting a British officer into the French staff?’
‘Well, yes and no. What we want you to do, once you’ve reconnoitred the situation, is to engage with each of the rebel leaders and assure them of our support. You will have access to sufficient gold to persuade them. We need to know contact details, locations, how large a force each of them can muster. How many arms they have and where we might deliver further equipment. Once we have all the intelligence we need, we’ll pull you out.’