by Iain Gale
Then he turned. ‘When I meet Marshal Massena, I need to meet him in battle on my terms. It must be on my terms, Keane. I am relying upon you to ensure that will happen. Major Grant will give you a new amusement on your way out. Good luck with it.’
‘An amusement, sir?’
‘A thing which might amuse you, Keane, and that might also help us to win this war. Take my good wishes to Colonel Sanchez and you may tell him that he will have his money just as soon as I can get it. I am sure that I can rely upon you to assist, in any way in which you may be asked.’
This last comment struck Keane as curious, but he made nothing of it. In fact the entire interview had been somewhat odd, with mention of his father and Wellington’s obstinacy about the impossibility of sending the Portuguese villagers to trial.
‘Good day, Captain Keane. I trust that when we next meet you will be the bearer of better news.’
Keane saluted and went to leave the room, followed by Grant, who closed the door behind them. Once outside, both men walked some distance away from the ADC who was hovering in attendance and a clerk who sat at a large ormolu desk.
Grant took Keane to one side. ‘That, I am guessing, was not entirely the meeting you had envisaged.’
‘Not entirely, sir. Although in truth I was dreading having to make my report.’
‘And I don’t blame you, my boy. It’s a tricky business, this, and we have to play it with great care. We may be here with the ostensible purpose of defending Portugal against the French, but both of us know, as well as the duke himself, that our real purpose is the interest of Great Britain.’
Keane nodded. ‘The duke spoke of an “amusement”, sir.’
‘His Grace’s idea of a joke, Keane. Here it is.’ He walked across to a wooden box, which Keane had noticed on entering earlier.
‘Sir?’
‘Well, open it up, man, go on.’
Cautiously, and thinking that the whole thing might be intended as a curious practical joke, Keane opened the lid of the box, which popped up with a click. Inside were a number of red leather-bound books. Grant walked across beside him, picked one out and closed the box.
‘What is it, sir?’
‘This, James, is a telegraph code book. Latest thing. We are introducing them into the army. To staff officers and the guides. Do you realize that, using the device with which that book corresponds, we will be able to communicate with troops in the front line within a matter of minutes? We have decided to set up a system of telegraph stations. It pains me to say so, but it is based on a system used by the French for some years with great success.
‘Of course, here in the Peninsula the enemy are unable to use a similar system. It would leave isolated forts exposed to the guerrillas and would be untenable. We, on the other hand, having the friendship of the guerrillas, are at liberty to emulate Bonaparte.’
He chortled to himself at the prospect of using a system perfected by the French against them. ‘We have established three lines of communication, with their focal point at Lisbon.’
Perhaps, thought Keane, that might explain Morris’s business there. Grant went on. ‘The Portuguese engineers – and in fact, Keane, they’re not at all bad – under their general Folque managed it. We now have a line stretching from Almeida to Lisbon. Sixteen posts, each of which is visible from the next. They are roughly some twelve miles apart. Another line runs between Barquinha and Abrantes, but that is smaller, with only two posts, and the third is devoted to watching the maritime activity in the Tagus. And then of course we have more in construction, along the defensive lines of which the duke spoke.’
‘Yes, sir. I understand the secrecy.’
‘Some of the stations have a mast, just like that of a frigate, up which, by a series of ropes and pulleys, it is possible to hoist a number of metal balls. Most are simpler affairs with a single post and a system of numbers indicated by the position of a wooden flag. D’you see?’
Keane nodded.
‘Do you realize, you can pass a message to the post at Almeida, and the command, even in Lisbon, may read it within a matter of hours? Hours, Keane, not days. Imagine.’
Keane frowned. ‘But sir, what if the French should see the signals? They will know what we intend.’
‘Yes, but General Folque has devised a code and that is what I now hold in my hand. A very simple system of numbers relating to commands and messages. He had it put down in a book. This is your copy.’
He handed Keane the small red leather-bound notebook.
‘A code, sir?’
‘Yes, a cipher which the French will be unable to read. Again, it’s something they have been perfecting for years, and here we are beating them with their own weapon. ‘And now I have something else for you, James. And I know that it will not please you. The duke has further orders for you.’
Keane looked at him. ‘Further orders?’
‘Orders that he asked me to relay to you.’
‘Tell me what they are, sir.’
‘Once you reach Don Sanchez, you are to proceed to Val de Mula, where you will find a unit of Portuguese infantry under the command of a Captain Foote, late of the 69th. With them will be a unit of the local militia, the Ordenanza. You are to take command of this force.’
‘To what end, sir? I have sufficient men, more than enough, in fact, for the purpose of intelligence gathering.’
Grant shook his head. ‘That’s just it, Keane. You are to use them to break up the local flour mills and prevent them falling into enemy hands.’
Keane stared at him. ‘I cannot believe it. Sir, this must be wrong. After what has just been said. Even by the duke himself. Are we now to destroy the flour mills? This will surely ruin the country, not just for the French but for generations of Portuguese. It cannot be right.’
‘Those are Wellington’s precise instructions, and you are the man to do it. I’m sorry.’
‘No, sir, I am sorry. I cannot do it.’
Grant grasped him by the arm. ‘You must, James, or face the consequences. To refuse such an order would ruin you.’
Keane thought again of Wellington’s comment about his father. He stared at the floor. ‘How many mills?’
‘All that you can find. He is set on it.’
‘This is not a job for a British officer. Why can the Portuguese army not do it?’
‘You are the man for the job, Keane. That is the duke’s perception. Using the Ordenanza to do the dirty work will at least soften the blow to relations with our allies.’
‘But under my command?’
‘The officers who command the Portuguese regulars cannot do it. It is a diplomatic compromise. And you must at the same time continue to ensure that Colonel Sanchez remains true to our cause. And of course you must ensure that the telegraph can operate fully. You understand?’
Keane nodded. He could see the logic now, and also that there was no way out. He laughed. ‘Well, sir, at least it will enlarge my command a little. I’ll make colonel yet, before the year is out.’
Grant smiled knowingly. ‘That you may, Keane, that you may.’
Grant showed him out, closing the door carefully behind him, but Keane had not gone more than a few paces and was about to descend the staircase when he was startled by a cough from his left. A figure in a red coat came from the shadows.
‘Major Keane?’ Major Cavanagh smiled at him.
‘Captain Keane, sir.’
‘Of course. I was forgetting myself. Or should I say, perhaps, anticipating the future.’
Keane was unimpressed by the clumsy manoeuvre, intended to woo him over to the opposition camp.
‘You have not had any opportunity as yet to draw the enemy into battle?’
‘No, sir. But please be assured that it is paramount in my mind.’
Cavanagh gave him a fatherly pat on the shoulder. ‘I shall rest in that knowledge, Captain Keane, just as you may rest in the assurance of advancement when that day comes. We need a battle, Keane. Now.’
With that, Cavanagh turned and walked towards the doors to Wellington’s rooms. Keane turned back to the staircase and walked from the building.
He made his way back through the village, his mind in turmoil. Cavanagh had not upset him. The man was a buffoon, and now Keane knew that his future, if he had one, lay with Wellington. Rather, he pondered the situation with the Portuguese. It was bad enough that they could do nothing about the villagers. But now to be told that he must personally supervise further operations against the peasants? It was too much. Of course he deplored anything that would bring innocent people to penury. But that was not his worry. What really concerned him was that it would be British soldiers, his own men included, who would suffer on account of the policy. He did not believe that Wellington or his staff had any real understanding of what was happening out in the countryside. He had seen it. Had seen the expressions on the faces of the villagers. He knew just how desperate they were and what they would do about it; and what revenge meant in this country of saints and shrines and superstition and vendetta. Before long it might lead to a fullscale rebellion, and then where would the army be? Fighting the French on one side and its erstwhile allies on the other.
Other thoughts preyed upon his mind. There was Pritchard. Of course he had discovered no more about him, and now all the facts seemed to indicate that the man was dead. But Keane was still no clearer as to why, nor who might have killed him. Grant and Wellington seemed to have bought into the story that he had blown himself up, and perhaps that was what Morris had told them. Who knew? He might be right. And why tell them so if he was not certain. Which brought him to Tom Morris.
This was the real worry. More than anything else. He could not dislodge the spark of doubt that was now lit in his mind against the man who for years he had counted as his best friend. But there it was. Nagging away like an old sore. How could Morris be sure that Pritchard had blown himself up? They had not properly discussed it, and that in itself was strange. He wondered if the time he had spent alone had changed his friend. Certainly, he told himself, Morris was no traitor. He was as loyal as he to the Crown and the army. But what did he know that Keane did not. There was something, some secret Morris had not told him and that he knew he must find out.
It struck him that it might have to do with whatever it was he was doing in Lisbon. His friend had never before spoken of having any business interests in Portugal. Keane wondered what it might be.
The evening air was growing cold as he entered the house which had been their billet previously. To his delight he learnt that the men had found it empty and reoccupied it as if it were their own.
They had got a fire going in the grate and were cooking something over it in a huge pot. Whatever it was, it smelt palatable enough and Keane guessed that it might be Gabriella’s work. She was sitting close to the fire warming her hands and he noticed, not for the first time in recent days, that her face looked drawn and she did not greet him with her usual smile. He guessed that it must have something to do with recent events. She came from peasant stock and he knew that she had reacted badly to the deaths of the villagers and their taking the prisoners to Celorico for trial. Thinking that perhaps it might change her mood, he spoke to her quietly. ‘The villagers will not stand trial.’
‘No trial?’
She looked alarmed and Keane realized why. ‘No, no, don’t worry. They will be set free. Very soon.’
She looked up at him and smiled. ‘Thank you. Thank you, captain. I am sorry for this. It is a bad business for us.’
Keane, not wishing to disabuse her of the idea that their freedom had been his doing, merely nodded and placed a hand upon her shoulder. He wondered whether any of the others had heard and hoped they had not. Archer was sitting in a far corner close to Leech, who was lying on a makeshift camp bed, covered with a blanket. Keane walked across.
‘I have no wish to offend you or to cast doubt upon your skills as a physician, Archer, but are you sure he would not be better cared for in the hospital?’
‘No, sir, I am quite sure. He would only catch a pestilence in going into that place. Believe me. He is better with us. Besides, his fever has just abated and his wounds are clean. Better to be struck with rocks than with ball or shot.’
Keane settled himself down in a chair and placed his boots upon a low table set in front of it. ‘I shall need two of you to accompany me to headquarters tomorrow before we leave. I have a package to transport back to the camp.’
Ross spoke. ‘Tomorrow, sir? Then we are not staying any longer?’
‘No, sarn’t, whatever you might have hoped, it’s back to Don Sanchez and the hills for us in the morning. That, it seems, is where we do best. We’re to collect another command.’
‘More men, sir? You’ll need another weight of gold at your shoulder before long.’
‘I shouldn’t get too excited, Ross. My new command is a unit of Ordenanza. The militia. God knows what they’ll look like or how they’ll fight.’ Realizing what he’d said he shot a glance at Gabriella, but she was intent on the cooking.
The others were seated around the large single room that had acted as the principle room of the simple dwelling, whose inhabitants had been a shoemaker and his family.
Silver had discovered the cobbler’s tools and his lasts and was busy investigating how they might best be used. He looked up at Keane. ‘Need your shoes mending, sir? I’m sure I could manage it. Not really much different from working a wood knife.’
Keane had seen Silver’s skill with the wood knife. Before joining the army, he had spent years behind the mast in the Royal Navy, and the long sea journeys had been whiled away in such things. His hands, although they may have looked to most people like shovels, were remarkably sensitive when it came to delicate work.
Keane knew the importance of sound footwear, particularly here in the Peninsula. His own boots he kept in good repair and liked to carry out routine inspection on his men’s footwear. In recent weeks, though, not surprisingly, he had been remiss.
‘That’s a kind offer Horatio, but my own boots are fine. You might ask the others, though. We all need to be well shod.’
Silver called out. ‘Garland, how are your shoes?’
Garland looked up from the carbine which he had been cleaning for a good twenty minutes. ‘What? What about my shoes? What do you mean, Silver?’
‘How are they?’
‘They fit me, don’t they?’
‘Yes, but how are the soles?’
‘Same as the rest. Made from leather.’
Silver shook his head and laughed. ‘What about you, Will?’
Will Martin shook his head. ‘I had these off a dead man just two weeks back. You recall. That Frenchie we passed lying at the side of the road. You remember. Looked a proper sight. Head half eaten away by crows. Perfect fit they are, and in good fettle.’ He wiggled his feet in proof.
Silver was considering whether he should ask Heredia, when he saw that he had crossed the room towards the fire and was talking to Gabriella. For a moment he stopped fiddling with the cobbler’s knife and watched the two of them talking in the flickering firelight as she continued to stir the stewpot. Heredia was clearly in the middle of some sort of explanation. He was gesticulating with both hands to impress a point on her. Silver stiffened and Keane glimpsed it.
Gabriella responded and lifted her left hand in emphasis. Then Heredia seemed to make another comment and Gabriella replied with a yell, almost spitting into his face. Silver looked up to see Heredia returning the insult and then she was at him, her hands scratching at his face. The trooper went for her and struck her on the cheek, sending her reeling. She rocked on her seat, missing the fire by inches. But Silver was up now and diving across the room towards Heredia.
Keane was suddenly aware that the man still held the cobbler’s razorsharp tool in his hand. He jumped up and tried to interpose himself between Silver and Heredia, but the latter had already jumped back and was looking for a weapon of his own. He fou
nd it in the leg of a chair which one of them had broken up for firewood and brandishing this was ready when Silver struck. The cobbler’s knife flicked through the air and caught Heredia on the hand holding the makeshift bludgeon. He yelled and aimed a blow at Silver’s head that caught him on the shoulder. Silver staggered and Keane took his chance. As the knife came up again, he pushed between the two men, knocking Heredia to the floor with a blow of his arm while at the same time grasping hold of Silver’s rising arm in a vicelike grip. Silver dropped the knife to the floor and Keane could see the fury in his eyes. Heredia pushed himself up from the floor and for a moment Keane thought that he might attack him. But, realizing it was Keane, he stopped himself.
Keane held them apart. ‘What the devil’s going on? Both of you, stop this, now. Heredia, drop that. Silver, if I see you reaching for that knife, I’ll knock you out faster than you can move. What do you think you’re doing? Explain yourselves.’
Silver spoke first. ‘It’s him, sir. He’s always staring at me. And at her. You saw, he hit Gabby. On the face. No one does that to my girl and gets away with it. Bastard.’
Heredia replied, ‘She deserved it. She called me a murderer. Said I had betrayed my own people. She talks shit. She’s from the gutter and she should go back—’
Keane interrupted. ‘Heredia, hold your tongue. That’s no way to speak of anyone’s wife. What did she accuse you of?’
‘She said that I had killed those villagers. The ones who went for Leech. That I shouldn’t have touched them. They were my people. That we were wrong. I only did what I thought was right. They might have been my countrymen, but what they did was wrong. They stained the honour of our country.’
‘So you killed them?’
Heredia nodded.
Keane turned to Silver. ‘I can understand your rage, Silver. I might have done the same. But we are a unit. We must act and fight together. If we begin to fight, to argue, with each other, then we cease to be effective. I cannot have this.’
Gabriella was sitting beside the fire, holding her cheek where Heredia had hit her. Still watchful of the two men, Keane turned to her. ‘What did you say to him?’