by Eric Flint
* * *
Driscol drove to his feet, the saber back in his hand, and went at one of them. Before he could get there, Henry Crowell had swatted the redcoat away.
He went for a second. But some Indian—Major Ridge, he thought—was there to cut him down.
The third, then. But that redcoat was already turning to face a new threat. Before he could get his bayonet into position, Sam Houston's sword went into his throat.
There was still a last. But he was surrendering, now, dropping his musket and raising his hands.
James Rogers was standing not more than six feet in front of him. He screamed again, leaping forward—a panther would have envied that scream—and shattered the man's skull.
There was nothing to cover the grief. No last deathblow that might remove the pain.
Staggering a little, more from sorrow than weariness, Driscol came over to John and dropped beside him on one knee.
Rogers was still alive, although Driscol could tell that he was going fast.
Still, he had enough life left to give Driscol a sly little smile.
"Know anything about Cherokee ghosts?" John asked, half whispering and half choking out the words. Blood was oozing from his mouth.
Numbly, Driscol shook his head.
"You don't want to, either. So you be good to my sister, or I'll haunt you."
His brother was kneeling next to him now, on the other side.
"You heard?" John whispered.
James nodded. Patrick thought that, from the dull expression on his face, James felt as numb as he did.
John smiled, then, and closed his eyes. He started to say something else, but died halfway through the second word.
Driscol thought the word was "forget," although he wasn't sure. The first had been "don't."
Sam swallowed, and looked away. He remembered the first time he'd ever seen John Rogers, on John Jolly's island. John and his brother had been swimming in the river. They'd both looked like seals, so swift they were.
Remembering, suddenly, that he was the commanding officer, Sam gave the area a quick and nervous inspection, his eyes ranging everywhere.
But there was no danger, not any longer. That group of British soldiers who went after Driscol and the Rogers brothers had been the last gasp of the assault. Their mates had already been falling back while it happened.
There were no British soldiers left in the bastion. None who were alive and uninjured, at least. There were quite a few corpses and wounded men.
Henry Crowell came up to him, still holding the sponge staff he'd used as a maul. "Sorry about your friend, Colonel."
"Yes. Thank you, Henry."
Sighing, Sam started to sheath the sword. Then, realized it was covered with blood. For a moment, he looked down at the corpse of the man whose blood it was, wondering if he could wipe it clean on his uniform.
But that would be just... horrid.
"Here, sir," Henry said softly. Looking, Sam saw that Crow-ell was extending the end of his sponge staff. "This'll do, well enough."
So it did.
With the sword finally sheathed, Sam went over to the breastworks. Henry came with him. They had to move three corpses aside to clear a good view. Two enemy, one of their own.
They did the work rather gently. Sam could have clambered onto the bodies, the same way he had when he came into the bastion. But now that the battle was over, that seemed unbearably wicked.
The enemy was leaving the field, moving back toward the barges that had ferried them across the river.
All of them. Gauging the numbers as best he could, Sam estimated that at least two-thirds of the British soldiers would make their escape. But those were the broken pieces of regiments, now, no longer fighting units. They weren't racing away in a rout, the way the Kentucky militiamen had done at the start of the battle. But they weren't maintaining much in the way of formation, either. Those were soldiers who'd been beaten, and beaten badly enough that they wouldn't be fighting any more this day.
"Do you think it's over, sir?" asked Henry. "I mean the whole thing."
Sam shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine. But since we're guessing...Yes. I think it's over. If we could beat them back here, why would they ever think they could get across the field at Chalmette?"
The only man who really mattered, at the moment, was the one man who didn't have to guess.
Pakenham sighed, when he saw the Forty-third and the West Indians join the Eighty-fifth in its retreat. "Robert was right," he said, speaking very softly. He was really just talking to himself.
Ignoring his cluster of aides, Pakenham left the riverside and strode to a place where he could look out over Chalmette field.
He'd always known the danger of that clear, open field. But now, having witnessed that horrible American artillery in full action, and the determination of the soldiers behind the guns, he could see it as it would be. Covered with the corpses of his soldiers. A carpet of redcoats from one end to the other.
We'd have lost two thousand men, I think, before we were driven back. And I doubt we'd have inflicted more than a hundred casualties on the enemy.
No reputation is worth such a cost.
He even managed a wry little smile. In all likelihood, it'd have been a posthumous reputation anyway. Here lies the gallant fool, Major General Edward Pakenham, Knight of the Bath.
Admiral Cochrane came up. Pakenham gave him a cold, hard glance.
"There will be no battle on Chalmette field, Admiral. I'll start pulling out the men tomorrow morning."
Cochrane nodded. The admiral was too smart a man not to realize that he'd pushed the army as far as it would go.
"Yes, I understand. I was thinking...We might finally catch Jackson napping, you know. If we move fast."
Pakenham chuckled. "You're quite a good strategist, Admiral. So long as you'll agree to leave the tactics to me. Yes, I was thinking the same thing myself all morning, as I punished an innocent tree. By all means. Let us give Mobile another try."
* * *
After the silence had lasted long enough, Robert Ross left the square to deal with his bladder. When he came back, hearing the silence still, he ordered another pot of tea. Tiana was back at the table.
"Would you care for some, my dear?"
"No." She was finally starting to cry. "I think he's dead."
"I think he's very much alive. That's what that silence means."
It meant something else, too; little to Tiana but a very great deal to Robert Ross. That silence—continuing, and continuing—meant that thousands of his men would live to see another day, with all their limbs and organs intact.
Perhaps he should take up another line of work. He was beginning to think like a bloody parson.
Tiana didn't shed many tears, for it wasn't her way. And by late afternoon she was smiling half the time, in any event.
Word had come back. A runner sent by Houston to Tiana herself. Ross was surprised that such a young man enjoying such a splendid victory should have been so thoughtful.
Patrick was still alive. He hadn't even lost any more limbs, amazingly enough.
She ordered pastries, too, for anyone who wanted to sit at the table and chat.
Chat with Ross, not her. The other half of the time, her eyes blue and empty, she was staring at the river. Houston's runner had also told her about the death of her brother.
Although Tiana herself did not participate in the conversation, a number of New Orleans matrons took her up on the offer of pastries. Most of them, speculatively eyeing the perhaps-eligible British officer whose uniform had sent them screaming away in the morning.
Chapter 49
February 12, 1815
Mobile Bay
"So we finally caught Jackson napping," Admiral Cochrane said with satisfaction. From his position on the walls of Fort Bowyer, he was looking north across Mobile Bay.
"Indeed so," said Pakenham. "Almost all of his troops remain in New Orleans. Still entrenched at the Jacks
on Line and in Fort St. John, according to the reports I've received. Apparently, he's convinced we intend to assemble a fleet of flat-bottom boats and attack him through Lake Pontchartrain."
The admiral was literally rubbing his hands with glee. "By the time he gets here—if he even tries at all—Mobile will be ours. And with it," Cochrane gloated, "the open road to New Orleans."
Pakenham smiled. "Well, it's hardly an 'open road,' sir. And the distance is probably close to two hundred miles, the way the army will have to march."
But his own expression was sanguine, as he gazed over the bay. "Still, it's vastly superior terrain to what we faced along the Mississippi. No swamps and—best of all—plenty of room to maneuver. Let Jackson try to match us on open ground, for a change."
Two days later, before the assault on Mobile could be launched, the HMS Brazen arrived with the news.
A peace treaty had been signed at Ghent. The war with the United States was over.
"So it is," Pakenham remarked stoically. He watched as his men rolled two casks of rum up to the gangplank, where the sailors would take charge of them.
"I'll ask you to handle these with dignity, sir," Pakenham said to the frigate's captain. "Contained within are the mortal remains of two of the finest regimental commanders Britain has ever had serve her colors. Colonels Thornton and Rennie."
"Aye, General. I'll see to it."
As the casks were hoisted into the ship, Pakenham felt a deep sadness. Thornton and Rennie, both gone. Not to mention hundreds of other brave men—more than a thousand, counting the earlier casualties at Bladensburg and the Capitol.
And for what?
There were times he found being a professional soldier rather trying.
Cochrane, standing next to him, seemed to understand his sentiments.
"Look at it this way, General. It's just part of the cost of building and maintaining the reputation and morale of a great army. Navy, too. There'll be other wars to come, when we'll need that."
Pakenham sighed. "Yes, Admiral. Exactly what I was telling myself."
A month later, Pakenham was feeling much better. Admiral Cochrane's stoic analysis had been proven right—and far sooner than Pakenham would have thought possible.
The major general got the news while he and his men were still aboard ship sailing back to England. Napoleon had escaped from his exile on the island of Elba and landed back in France just two weeks earlier. From there, it seemed, he was making his way to Paris, rallying his forces.
The war was on again. The dispatch ordered Pakenham to report to Wellington as soon as he arrived in England.
He had to restrain himself from crushing the dispatch in his fist, out of sheer exultation.
"A real war, by God!" he exclaimed to Gibbs. "No more of that miserable business with Cousin Jonathan."
Chapter 50
March 10, 1815
New Orleans
"Well, your whole country's erupting with joy, it seems like," Robert Ross remarked. "Not only is the war over, but it ended with a victory for you here in New Orleans. My congratulations, Colonel Houston."
The British general plopped the newspaper he'd been reading onto the wrought-iron table. "That calls for a drink, I'd say. My own people in England will be happy enough, too, even if it didn't end the way we'd have preferred. Still, it was never a popular war, back home, and now it's over."
Ross swiveled in his chair—also wrought iron—and caught the attention of one of the waiters who were moving among the tables on the Plaza de Armas. It was a sunny day, and the city's central square was packed with people. Fortunately, the cafés lining the square had showed the forethought to employ extra servants this day.
Houston grinned wryly. "The whole country except here." His chin swept around in a little quarter circle, indicating the crowd in the plaza. "These folks're here because it's a sunny day, is all. No end to the war in New Orleans."
Ross smiled. The rest of the United States might be celebrating the end of the war, and—a rare occasion, this!—hailing the heroic city of New Orleans for its valiant stand against the invader. But the acclaimed city itself was groaning under the lash of tyranny.
"How long do you suppose the general will maintain martial law?" he asked Houston. His casual tone made the question out to be an idle one. It wasn't a British officer's business, after all, to pry into the affairs of a republic with which his country was now at peace. Especially when that republic—one of its cities, at least—was chafing under the rule of a tyrant. New Orleans took to "martial law" about as well as a drunk takes to a temperance speech.
Sam shrugged, still grinning. "With Andy Jackson, who knows? His position is that until official word of the treaty arrives, he has no way of knowing whether the war is really over or not."
Houston pointed a big, accusing forefinger at the newspaper that was lying on the table. "Those are full of lies, you know. At least three-quarters full, these days, to hear the general. Who's to say that this isn't all part of a dastardly British scheme to get him to lower his defenses, while you prepare to strike a new and treacherous blow?"
His grin had steadily widened throughout. By the end, Ross was almost grinning himself.
"Indeed. I will say that I'm dazzled to discover—for the first time in my life—that we British have the wherewithal to plot and carry through such an all-encompassing scheme. Not only can we suborn newspapers—a scurvy lot of knaves, newspapermen, it's true enough—but even your own judges and magistrates, as well."
At that, Houston laughed aloud. Jackson had ordered one of the city's news reporters thrown in jail for writing an article that referred to him as a "despot." The newspaper had taken the issue to court, whereupon Judge Dominick Hall had promptly ruled in favor of the reporter and ordered Jackson to release him from custody.
Whereupon—just as promptly—Jackson had thrown Judge Hall into jail.
Houston started to speak again, but broke off when his eye spotted something.
Hastily, the young colonel rose to his feet. Rose, at least, in a manner of speaking. His stance, once he was out of the chair, was more in the way of a crouch than Houston's normally erect posture.
"Just realized that I've got a pressing errand to run. Must be off. General, my regards." A quick nod to the other occupants of the table. "Tiana. James."
And off he went. Scurrying, insofar as Houston could manage such an unnatural pace.
Puzzled, Ross peered in the direction that Houston had been looking just a moment earlier. He couldn't see anything especially noteworthy.
Well.
Except, perhaps, for a very attractive young Creole lady, moving slowly through the square. She was peering intently from table to table, examining their occupants. Her expression seemed to combine worry, eagerness, and suppressed anger, in about equal proportions.
She was trailed by an older woman. Her mother, perhaps, from the resemblance. The expression on her face was a bit similar, except that eagerness was entirely absent, and worry was overshadowed by anger. None too well suppressed, either, judging from the scowl.
"Ah," said Ross.
"You and Patrick both!" sniffed Tiana. She glanced at the two women as they slowly approached the table. "Which one's that, James?"
Her brother smiled. There was still a trace of sadness in the smile, but not much. A month after John's death, James's naturally insouciant nature had pretty well returned.
"That one's Dominique. I've forgotten her last name. Fortunately for Sam, she's nearsighted, and so is her mother. Or he'd never have made his escape."
Tiana sniffed again. "I told Patrick he shouldn't press the drinking issue. Sam Houston, dead drunk—in this city, anyway—doesn't get into half the trouble he can get into sober. Well, half drunk. I don't think he's had a purely sober day in weeks."
"Not one," James stated. "Not since it became obvious to everyone but Jackson that the war was over. Sam can stay away from whiskey when he needs to."
For now, Ross sai
d to himself silently. While he's still very young. That'll change as time passes, unless he stops drinking altogether.
Like Driscol, he knew the Irish curse better than he wished. And, like Driscol, knew that Sam Houston's drinking habits went beyond the normal heavy consumption of alcohol, even for Americans.