‘Who are you?’ he asked, in as unruffled a way as possible.
‘He asks who we are,’ relayed the woman.
‘Siamo Carbonari,’ replied the big man, with so much pride that the others threw their heads up at the word.
‘First Austrians, and now Carbonari,’ groaned Peto. He thought to raise his voice for clarity. ‘You are very good fellows, but we have no gold worth your taking. We are English officers.’
But the voice that from the quarterdeck could send hands aloft in a howling gale was greeted by indifference.
Hervey turned to him. ‘They asked if we were Austrian. Do you think we’re in Naples already?’
Peto shrugged. ‘There was no customs post on the journey up, as I recall.’
Hervey asked their interpreter.
She appeared to know, but asked the big man nevertheless.
‘Si,’ he nodded. ‘Sulla frontiera.’
Perhaps this explained the men’s composure, thought Hervey. They were abroad on the margins of the Pope’s domain and the kingdom of the Two Sicilies, where the writ of both monarchs ran weak, and where the fastness of the mountains to the north offered rapid refuge. But even so, the leisure with which they now proceeded was curious in his military eyes. ‘Since we are not Austrian, and you are honourable men,’ he tried, ‘may we now continue on our way?’
The woman stared at Hervey a while before turning to the big man and explaining.
The man shook his head impassively. ‘Venite con me,’ he said, beckoning and turning about, the press of men behind parting for him.
Hervey was vexed, but he was no more than a shade apprehensive, for somehow there seemed no menace in these Carbonari. He thought it strange that no attempt had been made to disarm the two of them. Perhaps they were covered by many more Carbonari concealed about this lonely stretch of road. It was certainly not a place to make a dash from. A couple of hunting dogs, lurcher types, fell in beside them, as well as several women, none of them older than they themselves.
The growing band climbed the rocky hillside, beneath pines and through scrubby bush. Hervey heard the carriage moving below, and looked back. ‘Ne vous inquiétez pas, messieurs. Do not worry at all,’ said the fierce-eyed woman. ‘We take it away to hide, that is all.’
Hervey was sure her French was not the native’s, but it was most convincing.
Peto was becoming indignant. He knew a little French, and now was the time to deploy it. ‘I am Commodore Laughton Peto of the Royal Navy and I demand to know your intention, sir!’
Hervey winced. A commodore, in common parlance an admiral – he would carry a heavy price if the Carbonari were minded to ransom.
The big man bowed in acknowledgement when the woman translated.
‘The comandante says he is honoured to have so exalted an officer in his company, and wishes to offer you our hospitality,’ she explained, throwing out a hand to indicate their encampment.
They had by now come up to the mouth of a cave, big enough to enter without stooping. A fire burned without smoke at the mouth, and a pot hung above it on a tripod. Beyond that there was little sign of camp comforts. ‘Why do you detain us, sir?’ asked Hervey.
The man appeared to understand much of the French, but he would not speak it, and he waited each time for the woman to explain before replying in Italian. ‘Because if I had let you go on you would have run into Austrian patrols. And if you had gone back it would have been the same. I could not risk you telling them of us.’ He took the pot from the tripod with a piece of leather. ‘Would you like coffee, signori?’
There seemed no reason to decline.
‘But we saw no troops of any sort on the road,’ pressed Hervey.
‘That is difficult to believe, signori. There are always pickets along that road, and in strength.’
‘I assure you, sir,’ replied Hervey, shaking his head. ‘We saw not a man. Although I confess we were sleeping for the past hour or so. But they surely would have stopped us?’
The comandante began hurried consultation with the half-dozen other men who had followed them to the cave. His voice had turned more than a touch anxious. He turned back to Hervey. ‘Do you swear, sir, by your soldier’s honour that the road is free of troops?’
Hervey frowned. ‘I repeat, sir, that we saw none at all in our progress. If they lay concealed in the trees, or ditch or I know not, then I cannot say.’
Clearly this intelligence had some effect on the plans of the Carbonari, but in what way Hervey could neither understand nor deduce.
‘What d’ye think agitates them so?’ asked Peto, becoming weary of the business.
‘I can’t tell. Either they’re planning an ambuscade and their birds have flown, or—’
‘You will stay here, signori,’ said the comandante suddenly. ‘And you will stay with them, Maurizia.’
The woman nodded, looking anxious for the comandante.
‘Venite!’ he commanded the others.
When they had gone, Hervey glanced at Peto.
The woman saw. ‘Do not try to leave, messieurs. There are men posted. They will shoot.’
Hervey and Peto exchanged looks which postponed the notion of escape. Hervey sipped his coffee, bitter though it was. ‘Your French is excellent, mademoiselle. May I ask how you acquired it?’
‘Why do you wish to know?’ she replied defiantly.
‘I have no motive other than curiosity, mademoiselle. Mine I was taught by a Frenchwoman who lived in England. I did not set foot in France until I was three and twenty.’
She smiled a little. ‘I have not even been to Rome, monsieur.’
‘Then you too had an able teacher.’
‘King Joachim.’
Hervey did not catch her meaning. ‘How so, mademoiselle?’
‘I was his mistress, monsieur.’
Hervey was stunned. Here was both honesty and history in uncommon measure.
Peto had followed the exchange, and looked eagerly for the particulars.
‘Not his only mistress, of course. But I believe he favoured me above the others for a time. Certainly among those who were not of the quality.’
Her candour was wholly disarming. It was not difficult to appreciate what Murat had seen, for her fierce eyes could surely blaze in an altogether different light. Hervey and Peto looked at each other in some confusion. ‘What are you doing here, mademoiselle, with these Carbonari?’ asked the former.
‘The Carbonari fight for our liberty, monsieur. We want no other sovereign but our own, Italian. And perhaps not even a king. We make a beginning here, in Napoli, but in time there will be Carbonari in all of Italy.’
‘And you yourself, mademoiselle?’
She looked at Hervey strangely. ‘I am Carbonara, too, monsieur. And my place is here, with the comandante, my man!’
Hervey was silenced by her passion.
‘From silk sheets to pine needles,’ said Peto, just loud enough for him to hear, and in a tone more of puzzled admiration than reproach.
Hervey was inclined to admire her too, though who could tell her true motives in being here? Perhaps she herself could not. But the life must hold few comforts. ‘Mademoiselle, what is the comandante’s intention here today?’
Her look at once became distant again. ‘Why do you wish to know?’
‘Well,’ he began, with a smile, ‘we are detained by you, and might wish to know what shall be our end, and when.’
‘You will come to no harm, messieurs.’
‘But why was the comandante so sure we had seen Austrian troops on the road?’
The woman hesitated at first. ‘There is a company in the town a mile or so along the road from here to Napoli. We intend capturing their weapons. They send patrols along the road to the frontier each day. They return about this time. You should have seen them.’
‘Well, we did not. How many men does the comandante have, mademoiselle?’
She did not answer.
‘Mademoiselle, I am a sol
dier. It is my interest to know, that is all.’
‘Enough,’ was all she would say.
Hervey thought for a moment. ‘Has the comandante placed pickets about the camp?’
The woman looked uncomprehending.
‘I mean, has he placed sentries all around the camp, at a distance, beyond the range of the camp’s noise?’
Again she looked as if she did not grasp the intent.
‘So that an enemy’s approach might be detected in time to have the comandante’s men take post.’
Hervey’s question was answered in part by a distant welter of musketry. He sprang up and past the woman in an instant. From the mouth of the cave it was clear the firing came from the direction they had travelled, but from up the hill rather than the road below.
The camp was now all alarm, running, cursing and shouting the order of the moment – a posto! avanti! presto! presto! Peto looked about with a disdain bordering on contempt. Drill was what they needed at a time like this, and drill was very patently not what they had ever tried, let alone perfected.
Hervey moved instinctively to the protection of a tree trunk, taking his pistol from his belt and porting it high. He called and beckoned to Peto, who was still standing at the mouth of the cave as if on his quarterdeck, for a naval officer did not seek cover in an engagement.
Peto almost strolled to the tree.
‘As soon as they’re all atop that rise’ (Hervey pointed with the pistol to where Carbonari were scrambling for all they were worth) ‘we can steal back down the hill and try to find the carriage.’
‘Very well,’ said Peto, as if he were agreeing to nothing more exacting than a change of sail.
The firing was now intense, perhaps no more than a hundred yards off. It was volleying for the most part, and regular enough for Hervey to estimate there was a full company, for no foreign troops could volley at that rate in a single rank.
Shots peppered the silence between volleys, the Carbonari answering defiantly.
‘We must grant they have pluck,’ said Hervey to Peto.
But Peto was dismayed to find that sticky pine sap had dripped onto the shoulder of his coat. ‘I had this made only last month in Naples,’ he complained.
Hervey turned to look, but a ragged volley from atop the hill took him by surprise. A ball hit the branches overhead, sending down pine needles and bits of bark. He looked back to see white coats coming over the crest. Carbonari, until that moment unseen, rushed forward past him, taking cover behind the rocks and returning the fire determinedly. He saw one whitecoat fall to what looked like a Baker rifle. Now was the time to slip away. He turned to search for his line, but shots over to the right made him look back.
The fierce-eyed woman fell as if dead not thirty yards from them.
As one Hervey and Peto sprinted to her. She lay moaning, blood spread the length of her back.
‘We can’t move her,’ said Hervey.
‘I think we must,’ insisted Peto. ‘To the cave, at least.’
They made to take her by her arms and legs, but lead whistled their way again, and bark flew from the tree next to them. ‘Christ!’ cursed Hervey, reaching for his pistol. He swung round to see a whitecoat rushing them with the bayonet twenty yards off, another close behind. Had he any choice? He levelled his pistol and fired in one movement. The first man fell stone dead.
Peto took aim at the second, fired, then cursed. Hervey dashed to the dead man, seized up his musket and rushed at the second with the bayonet. They met at the charge, but the whitecoat flinched at the last minute and Hervey’s blade drove in beneath the ribcage, running the man back a full six feet before he fell.
Out came the bayonet – easily enough, thank God – and Hervey stood on guard as other whitecoats came over the ridge. Shouting behind him, Italian shouting, made him glance over his shoulder. He flung himself to the ground just as the gun fired. A hail of metal whistled over his head and scythed through half a dozen whitecoats who had left the cover of the trees. He got up and scrambled back to find that Peto had all but reached the cave with the woman.
Carbonari were now swarming up the slope from the road, three dozen of them, perhaps more. Four giants of men hauled the gun back into alignment – it looked as big as a carronade – as women little more than girls carried powder from the cave.
A line of Carbonari now faced the attack, taking standing cover in the trees. Down the slope in a headlong rush came what was left of their picket – half a dozen men – to rally behind the firing line. Last man down was the comandante, his cloak and hat still in place, ribbons flying loose, the lurchers loping along at his side. As he reached the line he saw the woman lying at the cave’s mouth, and Peto kneeling over her trying to stem the bleeding. He called to Hervey. ‘Save yourselves, signori. This is not your fight.’
Peto took no notice, even if he understood. Hervey was repriming his pistol. He looked up and called back, ‘Have a care of your flank,’ indicating the direction of his skirmish.
The comandante looked right, saw the whitecoats lying dead, and beckoned the picket to that quarter. They were firing within the minute. The comandante looked round and nodded to Hervey grimly.
Soon there were whitecoats the length of the crest not seventy yards away. They presented, fired as one, but too high to have effect. A shower of needles and bark fell on the Carbonari line, then the whitecoats gave point with the bayonets and began doubling down the slope.
‘Aspete, aspete!’ called the comandante, glancing left and right to reinforce the command.
Hervey wondered where he had learned his nerve; it took a practised eye to await a bayonet charge.
‘Aspete, aspete,’ he continued, as the whitecoats quickened their pace. Then, at thirty yards, ‘Fuoco!’
The effect astonished Hervey as much as it shocked the Austrians. Hardly a ball failed to find its mark. The few whitecoats not hit seemed to falter, the touch of cloth now gone from left and right. Carbonari stepped boldly from behind the trees and began taking careful aim with pistols. It was over in a minute.
There was no despatching of the wounded, though, as the Spanish guerrilleros would have done. Hervey watched as Carbonari who had fought desperately now sought out those of both sides with life remaining, staunching blood, offering water. By rights they should have picked up their wounded and gone, for there was no knowing what other troops were even now marching towards the sound of the gunfire. Having once been caught off guard, it was, thought Hervey, imprudent to remain.
‘She needs forceps,’ called Peto from a few yards away. ‘I can feel the ball but it’s tight-lodged.’
The woman was conscious but perfectly still, making not a sound. Where he might find a surgeon’s bag, Hervey had not the first idea. ‘Do not trouble, signori,’ said the comandante in broken French, pushing new cartridges into the bandolier beneath his cloak. ‘The muli will come soon, and Maurizia she is strong.’ Hervey did not doubt it, though he thought that neither mules nor the woman’s strength would be enough. Her colour had turned almost grey.
But the stretchers came soon, and with a string of mules; their sconci ran ahead with long lead ropes, letting the animals extend up the uneven slope. For Maurizia they lashed a stretcher between two mules, and Peto, Hervey and the comandante lifted her into it and lay her face down, head to one side. She managed something which passed for a smile at her deliverers, a smile which plainly said her thanks. Then she turned her eyes to her comandante; they spoke of defiance still. She coughed the words, ‘In bocca al lupo, Domiziano. In bocca al lupo.’
The comandante took the ribbons from beneath his cloak, red, blue and black, and pressed them into her hand. ‘Crepi il lupo, Maurizia. Crepi,’ he said softly.
At his nod the sconci led the tandem off, up the slope and towards the mountain fastness. Not for Maurizia and the wounded Carbonari the hospital of the town below. That was for the whitecoats. They would take them to the road and leave them for their comrades; and better would be their
chances than those of Maurizia and her comrades.
Hervey watched the comandante as the train of mules passed. The man’s lips moved, but without a sound. Was he cursing, or praying? As the last mule passed him he made the sign of the cross then turned back to his unlikely comrades-in-arms. ‘Signori, you have done more than I can thank you for. Only it is time for you to leave now, or you will be fighting more.’ He spoke slowly and carefully, his French well chosen.
Hervey understood. He held out his hand.
The comandante took it, and Peto’s, then beckoned to a Carbonaro and gave him instructions to take nostri amici to where the carriage had been concealed.
Hervey looked about as the last Carbonari began striking their meagre camp. He wiped his brow with his sleeve. It was strange to see the streaks of powder smoke after so long. His clothes were blood-spattered, his hands too. He pulled the pistol from his waistband to draw the charge. How strange it all felt. But it felt strange because it was so familiar, almost comfortable.
‘Time for us to be hove off, Hervey,’ said Peto, guessing his thoughts.
‘Ay,’ nodded Hervey. ‘I’ve seen ghosts here.’
They spent the night in an uncomfortable hostaria not two hours’ drive from Naples. The horses were tired, and the coachman had had enough of a fright not to want to risk more by continuing in the dark. And both Hervey and Peto felt the need of a bath. It was nearly eleven the following day, therefore, when they reached the place just beyond Capodimonte which first afforded a view of the bay. Peto was soon searching with his telescope for sight of his squadron’s tops, and Hervey saw an already happy man become perfectly content when at last he saw his frigates’ ensigns. He himself had already concluded that his only chance of peace lay, ironically, with his return to arms. He would not say at once to Peto why, but he would ask him if they might go first to the post office before rowing out to Nisus.
A Call To Arms Page 8