An Act Of Courage h-7

by Allan Mallinson

  But the way was barred. The gunners were determined. The bridge-end bristled with handspikes, spontoons, muskets, and half a dozen of the bayonets with the nerve to run that far. The ventsman was putting in the primer-quill; in seconds more it would be ‘Stand clear!’ And then a hundred one-ounce iron balls would mangle every bit of flesh on the bridge.

  ‘No!’ bellowed Laming. ‘No, Hervey!’

  Hervey jerked the bit, and the gelding pulled up. It was futile.

  Wainwright, too, saw there was no way forward or back.

  Hervey reeled as a man lunged at him from the cover of the brush, the bayonet tearing through his cloak and into the saddle. He plunged the straight, thin blade of the artilleryman’s sword between collarbone and neck. As the man fell lifeless, Hervey looked back in dread for his covering corporal.

  His jaw fell open. Wainwright, with not even a sabre as goad, was urging his little Lusitano onto the parapet. Then, Horatiuslike, he leapt, astride her still, into the deep, dark Guadiana.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  BATTLE HONOURS

  Badajoz, late afternoon, 7 April 1812

  ‘Sixth Light Dragoons, draw swords!’ Lieutenant-Colonel Lord George Irvine, turned-out as immaculately as if on Horse Guards, gave the words of command with the confidence and pride of one who did so under the gaze of both his own and the defeated commanders-in-chief.

  Five hundred sabres were drawn from their scabbards with a flourish, to rest, vertical, awaiting the next order.

  ‘Sixth Light Dragoons, salute!’

  The private-men remained braced, as the officers brought their swords first to the ‘kiss’ and then down and outwards, flat-side offered, to their chargers’ right flank.

  There was no band, no double lines of infantrymen at the ‘present’. The Earl of Wellington (as lately he had been created) showed courtesy to General Phillipon; he did not render him military honours. Had the French surrendered before the assault on the fortress, they would have been able to march to their captivity bearing arms and colours. Since they had forced the issue – and after a practicable breach had been made – they were lucky to be spared their lives.

  Not that there wasn’t a deal of respect – grudging respect – for the tenacity with which they had defended the place: the army had turned its anger on the Spanish in the city rather than on the beaten French.

  Out of the San Cristobal fort, to which he had galloped over the Guadiana bridge in the early hours, when Wellington’s redcoats had finally taken the alcázabar, General Phillipon and his staff rode at a parade-walk. At fifty yards, the distance Hervey now stood from him, he looked every inch one of Bonaparte’s generals – the braid, the sashes, the plumes, the ribbons, all resplendent in the late-afternoon sun. A little closer and Hervey would have seen the tired truth, as did Lord Wellington now as he received the general’s sword. Defeat went hard with such a man.

  When the Sixth were stood down half an hour later, Sir Edward Lankester sought Hervey out. ‘The provost marshal’s men will want a deposition from you regarding the Spanish girl. Larpent intends putting up the gallows.’

  Hervey nodded. Wellington’s judge-advocate-general was a punctilious man; he would suppose there were accomplices to the murder. ‘Of course, Sir Edward, but in truth I saw only the one man – and he can say nothing.’

  Sir Edward smiled, but grimly. ‘The deposition is for your own benefit, Hervey. You can’t go about shooting His Majesty’s soldiers without remark!’

  ‘No, of course not, Sir Edward! I meant that—’

  ‘I know what you meant. Had I the means last night I’d have had a dozen of them shot down. It was infamous.’

  ‘Just so, sir.’

  Sir Edward fingered the loose bevel on Jessye’s throat plume. ‘This needs the armourer’s hammer.’

  ‘Sir.’

  ‘After they’ve seen to the sabres. God, what a sight they were!’

  Hervey raised an eyebrow. The fifty yards between Wellington and the regiment had worked not solely to Phillipon’s advantage.

  ‘Lord George wants to see you.’

  ‘See me, Sir Edward?’

  ‘Yes, see you! Do not have me repeat myself.’

  Hervey blinked. It was easy to forget that Sir Edward Lankester could be as tired as any of them. He saluted, handed his reins to his groom, and went to find his commanding officer. He did not see Sir Edward smiling wryly.

  ‘Mr Barrow?’

  The adjutant spun round, still holding his charger’s near-fore. ‘What is it, Hervey? I’m deuced busy!’

  ‘Sir Edward said the colonel wished to see me.’

  Barrow gestured to his groom to take the horse’s foot. ‘Dry it and lime-bag it,’ he said wearily, then turned back to Hervey. ‘Come with me.’

  They set off for the regiment’s headquarters.

  ‘What does the colonel want to see me for?’

  ‘I’ll leave that to him,’ said the adjutant, firmly.

  Hervey knew he was guilty of no offence – in any case, the adjutant would have been first to notify him of it – but he was becoming anxious nevertheless. He had never spoken directly to the commanding officer before, other than the usual civilities in the mess.

  ‘Mr Hervey, Colonel,’ Barrow announced, at the door of the white-walled hut which served as regimental headquarters.

  Lord George looked up from his writing table. ‘Come in, Hervey. Thank you, Barrow.’

  The adjutant left them, which Hervey knew to be irregular, but Lord George, though tired, did not look like a man about to deliver a reprimand.

  He saluted. ‘Good afternoon, Colonel.’

  ‘Good afternoon, Hervey. Stand easy, take off your hat.’

  Hervey did so gratefully.

  ‘Now, last night: you were witness to murder. The Eightyeighth’s colonel has asked to speak with you on it. I have agreed, and the provost marshal has no objection.’

  ‘Very good, Colonel.’

  ‘A dreadful affair, but it was an act of courage on your part that prevented further outrage.’

  Hervey said nothing. He knew that the mother and her two daughters had been interviewed already by at least three doctors, a chaplain and one of Judge-Advocate-General Larpent’s men.

  ‘You shall have a promotion.’

  Hervey’s spirits leapt. And then they sank again as he realized it would be promotion for shooting a man in red rather than the enemy – a cruel irony after three years’ fighting. ‘Sir, I had not expected—’

  ‘No doubt, no doubt,’ said Lord George, leaning well back in an old leather chair. ‘The promotion is not in the Sixth, I regret to say.’

  The words were like a cold douche. Hervey’s stomach tightened.

  ‘There just isn’t the vacancy. It would be in the Royals.’

  A promotion in Lord George’s old regiment (and evidently, therefore, of his arranging) – Hervey knew he was rewarded and honoured. ‘I thank you, Colonel. It would be a great privilege.’

  Lord George nodded.

  ‘But I could not accept.’

  ‘What?’

  Hervey was surprised his commanding officer appeared not to understand. ‘Colonel, these past three years I have come to know a good many men in the Sixth, and to trust them – and they me, I believe – and I would see the war to its end in their company. With respect, Colonel.’

  Lord George leaned forward again, and sighed. ‘Sit down, Hervey.’

  Hervey pulled a wooden stool towards the writing table.

  ‘I greatly admire your sentiment, but there can be no promotion in the Sixth for a year at least. I don’t say the war will be ended by then, but it can’t run much longer in Spain now that Badajoz is ours.’

  Hervey shifted awkwardly. ‘I understand, Colonel.’

  ‘Do you? This lieutenant’s vacancy is solely on account of circumstances in the Royals. Their colonel has asked me if I have a nomination. That is unlikely ever to occur again.’

  Hervey felt his cer
tainty only increasing. ‘Colonel, with the very greatest of respect, I request to remain in the regiment.’

  Lord George shook his head, but he smiled just perceptibly, too. ‘Hervey, I shan’t call you a damned fool, though others might. You may, of course, remain cornet in the regiment. And, I might add, I myself shall be pleased of it. You have scarce put a foot wrong since we came to the Peninsula.’

  ‘Thank you, Colonel.’

  ‘Very well, you may go. And you may tell Sir Edward that he may collect his champagne when next we are in proper quarters!’

  Hervey returned the smile as he replaced his Tarleton, and saluted.

  As he walked back to A Troop’s lines, the sun now low in the sky behind him, he gazed east. The men with bayonets had broken open the door to Spain (Lord George had said it). Now it would be a run to the French border. They might get a footing in France itself before the allies in the east could get across the Rhine. Might they even ride to Paris? He could not say how many miles that would be, but already they must have marched a thousand – more – since first they had come to the Peninsula with Sir John Moore. He knew full well, as Lord George had said, that some would call him a damned fool to turn down promotion – and in a regiment like the Royals. But how could he leave men with whom he had shared so much? Perhaps there would not be so much fighting with the bayonet now? But in that case there would be more work for the cavalry to do . . .

  Hervey wondered what his troop-leader would say – Sir Edward and his ‘long point’. Perhaps, indeed, the point had not yet begun: perhaps they were only now going to bolt their fox, from his earth in Badajoz. Monsieur Reynard would then be running over country he knew well, and they would be hunting him with followers strung out all the way from Lisbon.

  No matter which way he looked at it, Hervey was sure he had made the right decision. Three sieges it had cost the army to take this place, and now he could turn his back on it for ever and fix his gaze, albeit by his map still, on the Pyrenees.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  UNHAPPY RETURNS

  Reeves’s Hotel, Rua do Prior, Lisbon, 8 January 1827

  Private Johnson put more wood on the fire, and shook his head. ‘I bet it won’t be any colder there, that’s all I can say.’

  Hervey took less consolation in this dubious proposition than his groom might suppose. ‘Thank you, Johnson. I think, however, the prospect of England is not a warming one.’

  ‘Well I’m fed up wi’ this place. Tha d’n’t know ’ho to trust.’

  ‘I beg your pardon, Johnson, but one knows very well whom to trust.’

  Johnson frowned. ‘Tha knows what I mean, sir.’

  Hervey sighed. ‘Yes, I know what you mean.’

  ‘Will tha be gooin’ to see Mrs Delgado again?’

  ‘Yes,’ Hervey replied, warily. ‘But not for a day or so, I would imagine.’

  ‘I like Mrs Delgado.’

  ‘Yes, Johnson, so you have never failed to inform me.’

  He had not minced words with his groom for years. Indeed, Johnson was less a soldier-servant, more family, of sorts. Hervey knew well enough what were Johnson’s thoughts: they were simple, probably too simple. But what was there to stop him riding to Belem and asking for Isabella’s hand? It was what he desired, was it not? There would be vexations, on account of Isabella’s religion no doubt, but they could be overcome. There was no woman he admired more – save his sister. And Isabella excited in him as much passion as any he had felt in . . . well, it was better that he make no comparison in that regard. Did he love her? He believed he did. Why was he not certain? Because a part of him – the part that loved in the way he had once known – had died in the snowy wastes of America along with Henrietta.

  But what of Isabella herself ? What could be her feelings for him? They had not spoken on any terms of intimacy; she had given no sign. He was long past any diffidence that would inhibit a proposal on these grounds, but how might he love a woman – take a woman as his wife – who did not at heart share his regard or passion?

  Or was that the adolescent’s, the romantic’s, notion – the very thing he had resolved to be done with? If there had been one profit in his caging in Badajoz it was (he flattered himself) an understanding of his condition. That, and a resolution to put unsatisfactory matters to rights. He had hoped to be spared any public discipline, yet he knew in truth that atonement without penance was not possible. Especially was this true where Colonel Norris was concerned. Perhaps he ought not to be too dismissive of Norris’s tiresome caution. Men had died, after all, in the course of his own designing.

  ‘An’ I don’t see why there should be all this trouble either.’ Johnson sounded quite decided.

  ‘There was only ever a possibility of avoiding trouble, as you call it, if things remained in Lisbon. I was lost as soon as the Horse Guards learned of it, let alone the War Office.’

  ‘Will Corporal Wainwright get in trouble?’

  Hervey shook his head at the thought of his covering corporal on the bridge: the courage was one thing, the presence of mind quite another. ‘I cannot think even Colonel Norris could see anything but honour in what Wainwright did. I’m determined he shall have some reward.’

  ‘Ah wish ah’d seen it. Why didn’t ’e just jump wi’out ’is ’orse, though?’

  Hervey shook his head again. ‘He said he thought he would be a burden without her!’

  Johnson nodded, perfectly understanding. ‘An’ ’e’s still only a young’n!’

  ‘Indeed, Johnson.’ He started searching again among the paraphernalia of uniform piled ready for packing. ‘Where is my button-stick?’

  ‘But that doctor were brave an’ all.’

  Hervey looked up. ‘You know, Johnson, it was fifteen years ago, the business at Badajoz. I could never have imagined what long shadows it cast. I didn’t tell you the other two daughters died of fever before the war was ended, and that his wife took her own life not long after. He might have been a broken man – or, at least, a very bitter one. Yet I never met a kinder man.’

  ‘Will ’e be in trouble, d’ye think, sir?’

  Hervey shrugged. ‘He cannot very well return to Spain, at least for a while. Mr Forbes at the legation is taking good care of him. They spoke of some employment in the Americas. I shall see him again before we leave, I hope.’ He threw up his hands in frustration. ‘Where is that button-stick?’

  Johnson laid down the bellows. ‘Why don’t tha let me do that, sir. Sit down and ’ave thi coffee while it’s ’ot.’

  Hervey sighed. He had no need of the button-stick anyway, except to occupy his mind. He sat in the armchair by the smoking fire and poured out some of the thick black brew which Johnson had perfected over many years of improvisation with the most unpromising of raw materials, and then picked up the letter again. ‘I must tell you frankly, Johnson: the Duke of York is greatly angered. Lord John Howard tells me all in this, here.’

  Johnson took up the poker again, and scowled. ‘Ay. But t’Duke’d never ’ave known if Colonel Norris ’adn’t told ’im.’

  ‘Except that the Spanish ambassador has probably also protested.’

  Johnson stopped poking the fire, and turned with a look of uncharacteristic anxiety. ‘Sir, tha doesn’t think tha’ll be—’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Well, I don’t know rightly – whatever it is as ’appens to an officer.’

  ‘Cashiered?’

  ‘Ay, sir.’

  ‘Quite possibly. I imagine the Horse Guards would not go to the trouble of ordering a general court martial otherwise.’

  ‘An’ tha’s not worried?’

  Hervey half laughed. ‘Johnson, in truth I’m so dismayed by how we seem to arrange things in the army that I hardly care what happens. I believe I may say that I would not do the same again, for I see all too clearly how things have become, but in all honesty I cannot regret what I did, for it was all I had learned in these eighteen years a soldier.’

  ‘Ay, well said, Ma
jor ’Ervey. An’ Gen’ral Clinton says ’e’ll speak for thee, doesn’t ’e?’

  ‘Oh yes, have no fear, Johnson. There’ll be testimonials enough. But if the Duke of York is as angered as Lord John says he is, it will be to no avail. He’s an old man, and a sick one too. His opinions are more decided by the day, and they are not favourable to junior officers who take things upon themselves, especially in the face of their seniors.’

  ‘All this is because of Colonel Norris.’

  ‘All this is because of me, Johnson. I cannot escape the responsibility.’

  Johnson stood up and looked at the fire despairingly: no wood he could find in this place gave off any heat. ‘Very Christian that is, Major ’Ervey. Some consolation to thee, I suppose.’

  Hervey scowled back.

  ‘An’ why ’asn’t tha been to see Mrs Delgado an’ ’er father?’

  ‘What has that to do with it? I told you anyway: I have been, and shall go again as soon as I am able. You forget, perhaps, I am in open arrest.’

  ‘Colonel Laming’s been to see ’er.’

  ‘I am glad to hear it. But I cannot call on her and her father before Colonel Norris gives me leave.’

  ‘Tha knows they might go to England? On account o’ t’trouble ’ere.’

  Hervey looked surprised. ‘No, I did not. How did you come by this?’

  ‘Colonel Laming’s man.’

  Hervey’s eyes widened. ‘I compliment you on your sources, I’m sure!’

  ‘Ay, ’e ’eard they’d be gooin’ by t’end o’t’month.’

  ‘Well, I have not seen Colonel Laming these last few days, I regret to say.’ Hervey sounded especially thoughtful. ‘He has important duties with General Clinton. He says he will come by tonight, all being well.’