by V. A. Stuart
O’Leary, Phillip thought, had carried out his orders admirably and, ever a hater of bullying officers, would, probably have enjoyed the grim pantomime had he been close enough to witness it. He himself did not, although he had given the order; but he recognized its necessity and knew that the odds against the success of his desperate little sortie were no longer as great as they had been. They might, indeed, have been halved for, as he had hoped, the loss of their commander threw the green-uniformed gunners into momentary panic. Some took to their heels and ran to the edge of the ravine for cover, from whence they kept up a desultory musket fire, too far away to be effective. The rest held their ground, making strenuous, efforts to lower the elevation of their gun and bring it to bear on the new and unexpected target presented by the charging sailors, who had seemingly sprung from nowhere. The bluejackets—as was their wont when there was a prospect of coming to grips with the enemy—were cheering at the tops of their voices with a lusty exuberance that belied their scanty numbers and evidently convinced the Russians that others must be following in their wake.
Several more of their riflemen took refuge in flight but the gun’s crew, after a valiant struggle, brought the muzzle of the twelve pounder round at last. Phillip found himself facing into it and, his brain suddenly ice-cold and all his perceptions sharpened, glimpsed a raised linstock, glowing redly above the dull metal of the gun-barrel. He yelled a warning to his party to fling themselves flat, aware that at point-blank range, this might be their only chance of survival. Round shot, striking rocky ground, could do more damage even than grape, as he had seen yesterday when Sir Colin Campbell had ordered Captain Barker’s troop to load with it.
But … he had his pistol in his right hand, he realized, the hand-spike he had taken from O’Leary in his left. He came to a halt, breathing hard, forced himself to take careful aim at the man holding the linstock, and fired the pistol. Then, without waiting to see whether or not he had managed to hit his target, he hurled his body across the gun and rammed the hand-spike into the touch-hole with all his remaining strength, using both hands to drive it home. To be fully effective the spike had, of course, to be broken off but this was beyond him, Phillip knew, for he was surrounded by green uniforms.
A bayonet jabbed at him viciously; he eluded it, only to be met by another and then the butt of a Russian musket crashed down on the back of his head. The green uniforms vanished, swallowed up in the sea of pain which swept over him. The last thing he remembered was the sound of British cheers, coming from a vast distance, followed by a tremendous explosion which he imagined to have taken place within the confines of his own head.
After that he sank into the dark and frightening silence of a pit he knew instinctively was bottomless… .
CHAPTER TEN
1
When Phillip returned to partial consciousness, it was still quite dark and, on all sides of him, he could hear the groans of wounded men. Some asked for water, others begged for help, to enable them to change position and one, who was quite close by, asked again and again when the ship which was to evacuate them would arrive.
None received any answer that Phillip himself could hear, although he noticed a few dim figures carrying lanterns, who moved about in the distance and paused here and there, seemingly at random, in response to some sufferer’s plea. He supposed that they must be medical orderlies or surgeons but, since he felt no more pain than usual from his bruised leg, he did not call out to them and, in any case, they did not come near enough for him to do so. He was neither anxious nor afraid and, beyond a vague desire to know how he came to be where he was, content to remain there, mute and uncomplaining. He was also very tired and, after a while, drifted back to sleep again, only occasionally disturbed when one of his fellows cried his agony aloud. Waking once, he heard and recognized the voice of a priest, administering the Last Rites to a man a few yards away and again, some time later, when another man prayed aloud, apparently alone.
It was daylight the next time he woke and a thin grey drizzle was falling for which, at first, he was grateful since it enabled him to assuage a thirst he had just begun to feel. After a time, however, when the drizzle became a downpour soaking through his clothing, he started to shiver and, as his discomfort in-creased, his acceptance of his situation became less passive. Where, he asked himself, had they brought him, and why? Presumably he had been wounded, although he had no recollection of anything of the kind but, if this were the case, why was he not in one of the field hospitals, or dressing stations, receiving attention? Had he, perhaps, been taken prisoner and was this the way the Russians treated their wounded prisoners?
Phillip attempted to sit up, hoping to identify his surroundings but found the effort beyond his strength. Even the mere raising of his head caused a feeling of nausea and an alarming dizziness so, after waiting until both these unpleasant sensations had subsided, he leaned cautiously over on his side, intending to question the man lying next to him … only to recoil in horror when he realized that the man was dead. An infantry soldier, in British uniform, he had evidently died of cholera within a short time of offering up his lonely prayer in the darkness and, reminded all too vividly of North, Phillip felt beads of sweat break out on his brow. He had seen many men die since coming to the Crimea but, for all its ghastly familiarity, death from cholera still shocked him and it was a considerable time before he could bring himself to lean over to his other side. His other neighbour was, to his relief, alive—a slim young trooper of the 11th Hussars, whose theatrically magnificent uniform was so stained and filthy that it was scarcely recognizable. He turned a gaunt, unshaven face in Phillip’s direction when he spoke and said, in reply to his question, that they were on the Hospital Wharf at Balaclava.
“We’re waiting for a ship to take us to Scutari, or so they told us. But no ship has come and I have been here since they carried me down from the Cavalry Camp. Our regimental surgeon took my foot off and patched me up and then he said he’d send me down to Balaclava, to the hospital, where I’d have better care. Instead they dumped me here … to rot, I suppose.”
“But surely—” Phillip began, bewildered by the despair in the young trooper’s voice.
“To rot,” the boy repeated, with stark bitterness. “No food, no shelter … nothing but a sip of water from one of the Highlanders’ women, who came down during the night.” He raised himself on one elbow to study Phillip’s uniform with resentful blue eyes. “You’re a naval officer, are you not … sir? Can you not tell me why there are no ships?”
“There will be ships, lad. There are plenty of transports available to convey wounded to Scutari. Do not lose heart.”
“You haven’t heard the rumours, then,” the young cavalryman returned. “Balaclava is to be abandoned and all of us with it. The ships have gone to the French anchorage, save for those over there—” he gestured towards the harbour Phillip could not see and then, turning his face away, lapsed into a brooding silence from which he refused to be roused.
Phillip stared dazedly at his uncompromising back, wondering what in the world he had meant. Memory slowly returned. Had not his brother Graham told him of the rumour that Balaclava was to be abandoned? He had said that Captain Dacres, after bringing the Sanspareil into harbour, had issued orders that no other ships were to be permitted entry, for whatever purpose … and that this included evacuation of the wounded. But … he frowned, in an effort to remember. Since then surely there had been a conference between Lord Raglan, Sir Colin Campbell and … yes, of course, Admiral Lyons, to which he himself had been sent to summon Captain Dacres. One of them, he could not recall which, had assured him that neither Balaclava nor the wounded waiting there for evacuation would be abandoned and, indeed, had added, “So long as any of us have breath in our bodies.” If he told the young Hussar this, perhaps … unwisely, Phillip sat up. He glimpsed the masts and spars of the Sanspareil in the distance, bare of canvas, and those of another ship, a frigate, which were much more familiar to him, and then ev
erything whirled about him in crazy circles. He fell back, striking his head and felt himself sinking once more into the dark and bottomless pit from which he had only lately returned.
This time, however, he was not alone for Catriona Moray was with him, holding his hand in both her own. Her voice, with its remembered lilting charm, told him quietly and confidently that he was going to get well and that she would care for him.
“Narishkin?” he asked, remembering. “Is he still with you?”
“He is dead,” Catriona answered. “He died soon after you left and they buried him, with the dead of the 93rd. I do not believe that he would be ashamed to lie in their company.”
No, Phillip thought, he would not. Strangely, with Catriona beside him, he did not think of Mademoiselle Sophie save, fleetingly, as Narishkin’s widow.
“What of the battle?” he asked. “Did we hold off the attack?”
“You mean yesterday? Oh, yes, the Russians were driven back with heavy losses—four hundred killed, I have heard. Many of them retreated from the Inkerman Ridge into a ravine—the one they call the Careening Ravine, I think—and one of our Lancasters had their range. They say that our guns won the day—the Horse Artillery did splendid work, Sergeant MacCorkill told me, in support of the Second Division, and the Guards, although they were standing by, did not have to go into action at all. But …” she sighed. “War is a terrible thing. One cannot glory in any victory, when one sees, as I am seeing now, the cost of it … here on this wharf. These poor, suffering men, left here without food or water, I—we, that is to say, all the women—have been here most of the night. That is how I came to find you.”
“Thank God you did!” Phillip whispered.
A gentle hand came out to touch his head. “This dressing should be changed, Mr Hazard. I will see to it and bring you food, as soon as I can. But it will mean leaving you for a little while, because I have used up all the dressings I had.”
He did not want her to leave him, did not want to relinquish the small hand he had been holding in his but, with a murmured apology, she disengaged it. “I must go, Mr Hazard. There is so much to be done. Only two surgeons are working here … I am going to ask for more. These poor men cannot embark in a ship for Scutari without having received proper medical attention. Some have not even had their wounds dressed and …” Her voice broke suddenly on a sob and, to Phillip’s distress, she was gone.
Following her departure, he lay for some time in a state of curiously dazed apathy, uncertain whether, in fact, he had seen and talked to her or whether—like Mademoiselle Sophie—Catriona Moray, too, was a figment of his own imagination, conjured up because he had need of her. After a while, the rain ceased and the sun came out and, bathed in its soporific warmth, he slept, less conscious now of the discomfort of his damp clothing and of the wooden boards on which he lay.
He wakened, feeling refreshed and almost himself again, to find that he was being carried on a stretcher across the wharf. Martin Fox was walking beside the stretcher and, seeing him open his eyes, gripped his shoulder with a warmth of affection and relief that pleased as much as it surprised him, for Fox was not given to displays of emotion.
“Phillip—thank heaven we found you!”
“Martin, my dear fellow, it’s good to see you. But what are you doing here and—where are you taking me?”
Fox smiled at him. “Why to Trojan, of course,” he said, answering the second question first. “She’s here, in harbour, did you not know? As to what I was doing here—I was searching for you.”
“For me?” Phillip echoed, puzzled.
“On the Admiral’s orders,” Martin Fox replied. “You were posted missing, believed killed or captured, apparently after yesterday’s affair … concerning which there are numerous stories of your gallantry in capturing an enemy field gun, with a party of our Jacks, armed only with cutlasses. That’s true, I take it?”
Phillip frowned, trying to remember but his mind was still blank where this episode was concerned, and he could only shake his head. “I simply don’t remember, Martin.”
“Well, everyone else does, I assure you. I … careful, there,” Fox warned the stretcher bearers, as they reached the end of the wharf, where a boat was waiting. “Cox’un, lend a hand. Two of you take the foot of the stretcher and—”
“I can walk,” Phillip protested and proved that this was no idle boast by stepping, unaided, into the boat. Familiar faces beamed at him in welcome and willing hands assisted him to the sternsheets, where Midshipman O’Hara, the boat commander, wrung his hand, stammering in his eagerness to express his own welcome.
“How,” Phillip asked when, the greetings over and the boat under way, Martin Fox took his place beside him, “did you learn that I was neither killed nor captured? And how did you know where to look for me?”
“You can thank Seaman O’Leary for the information that you were still alive, Phillip. You had posted him, it appears, with a rifle to give your party covering fire. Well, when the gun was taken, O’Leary went in and dragged you out of the mêlée. According to his account”—Fox permitted himself a quick grin—“you were buried under a mountain of Russian bodies. Fifty, at least, though the number grows each time he repeats the story … he’s aboard the Trojan, incidentally, suffering from a flesh wound in the leg. He came aboard this morning, at first light. He told us that he’d lost touch with you, when you were both taken to a field dressing station to have your wounds attended to, but he swore you were alive and not in enemy hands. So we started a search for you. You should have been taken to the Diamond, of course, or to the naval field hospital at Kadi-Koi. But that has been moved to the Upland, and our search there was both abortive and time wasting. We did find two seamen who had been in your party, though, and one told us that a military stretcher party had taken you to Balaclava. As you weren’t aboard the Diamond, the embarkation wharf was the only other possibility. On our way there, we met a singularly beautiful young woman from the 93rd’s camp, who said she had seen and spoken to you and told us exactly where to look.”
Catriona Moray, Phillip thought gratefully. He had not, after all, imagined her visit and, as soon as he was physically able to drag himself up to the Highlander’s camp, he would call on her to offer his thanks. His thanks and, perhaps … he sighed.
“What of the rest of my party, Martin?” he asked.
“The cutlass party—oh, most of them survived, I understand. A number were wounded but they’re aboard the Diamond. If there are any of them on the wharf, I left orders with our stretcher party to transfer them to the Diamond, so don’t worry about them, Phillip. Only military wounded are on the wharf and we’re not permitted to interfere with the Army’s arrangements for them.” Fox shrugged his broad shoulders, an expression of mingled anger and concern on his face. “God help them, poor devils! The Army’s arrangements appear to be pitifully inadequate, to put it mildly … as you know better than I.”
Remembering the young Hussar and the man who had died of cholera beside him during the night, Phillip felt sickened. “And precisely what are the Army’s arrangements for them, Martin?” he demanded, his throat tight.
Martin Fox repeated his shrug. “They await the arrival of a ship to evacuate them to Constantinople. But Captain Dacres, who is in command of the harbour defenses, as you probably know, has forbidden any ships to enter, except those required for its defense. This order is to remain in force until the Russian threat to Balaclava is removed.”
“But in the name of humanity—” Phillip exploded.
Fox laid a hand on his arm. “Do not blame Dacres,” he begged. “His responsibility is to hold the port against any attack the enemy may launch. The Army were informed of the order before it was issued but, in spite of this, they continue to send wounded down to the wharf, without making any provision to feed or shelter them. And there are only two surgeons—two, Phillip—to care for them! If it had not been for the Highlanders’ women, including your beautiful Mistress Moray, and some of ou
r off-duty Jacks, the mortality on that wharf would be twice what it is. It’s bad enough, in all conscience as”—he reddened—“again, you know better than I. But at least we’ve got you safely away, thank God.”
“Amen to that,” Phillip responded, with deep sincerity. The boat was nearing Trojan, he saw, and at the sight of her, his heavy heart lifted. It would be good to be aboard Trojan again, even though his stay on board must, of necessity, be brief.
“How is Captain Crawford, Martin?” he asked.
Martin Fox avoided his gaze. “He went down with an attack of fever yesterday as, I understand, Captain Dacres did also. Both were ashore, dining at one of the army camps together and, I fear, must have picked up the infection there. Captain Crawford is one of the best commanders I have ever served under—the best, that is to say, with a single exception, my dear Phillip.” He looked up then, to look Phillip full in the eye, and went on flatly, “But his health is far from robust and this has hit him hard.”
“He’s still aboard?”
“Yes—confined to his cabin. I’m temporarily in command.” Fox hesitated, as Midshipman O’Hara brought the boat smartly alongside and the bowman secured his boathook to the chains. “Captain Dacres has asked to be relieved of his command.”
“Of command of the Sanspareil, you mean?” Phillip stared at him.
Martin Fox nodded, “Of Sanspareil and the harbour defenses. It is rumoured that he is to be invalided. Commander Heath of the Niger is expected to succeed him … he went aboard Sanspareil this morning early, during the Middle Watch, I believe.”