Infernal Revolutions

by Stephen Woodville

  ‘From what?’

  ‘Loons like you. Now climb back up the way you came.’

  With difficulty I did so, and stood looking at the Hall in disbelief as a pair of irons was clamped around my wrists. I was still watching when one of the top rooms flared into light and three tiny figures appeared in the window-frame. Squinting, I could just make out ‘twas the Philpotts Three, and if they had been awakened by the noise it followed that they could hear me if I yelled loud enough. I was in the middle of taking the deepest breath of my life when a neckerchief ball was plugged unceremoniously into my mouth.

  ‘There,’ said the officer, ‘that’ll keep you quiet until we’re out of hailing distance of the Hall.’

  Unfortunately for me, however, he did not keep his soldiers quiet in the same way, and I had no alternative but to listen in terror as they outlined, in great detail, the joys of the cat.

  ‘Looking forward to it, me,’ summed up one of the soldiers eventually, appetite whetted. ‘First deserter we’ve caught since April. Make an example of you, Sergeant Mycock will. You’ll be lucky to come out of it alive.’

  This turned out to be true, for I experienced that same afternoon the most exquisite pain this side of Hell. Stripped to the waist and tied to crossed halberds, I was stroked by Little Bob until my gag was bitten through, and my head and tongue lolled. Sentenced to fifty strokes, I knew no more after twenty, which must have been a disappointment as far as Sergeant Mycock and the other barbarians in the regiment were concerned, but it was no doubt some consolation to them to hear the agony in the screams, cries and whimpers I did emit, stripping me of all dignity. Strangely, even in my most extreme suffering I did not cry out for Jesus to comfort me; instead, so I was told later to my great humiliation, I invoked the name of Piggy Poo Face, my first pet pug – no doubt to the comic relief of the assembled company. Eventually, unconscious, I was taken back to the Martyr and left to lie face down on a makeshift bed in the stables until my back dried out. Truly, the sobriquet of Bloodyback had been earned.

  ‘I don’t want to rub salt in your wounds, Harry,’ said Dick Lickley on a visit the following day, ‘but I think an apology to Little Bob here is in order. He’s not said a word since the whipping. Upset him, it has.’

  ‘Bob,’ I moaned, putting as much sarcasm into my voice as I could, ‘I’m truly sorry for what I made you do to me. Please forgive me.’

  ‘I’ll think about it,’ said the sulking youngster eventually, before leaving with a great slam of the stable door.

  ‘There, that wasn’t painful, was it,’ said Dick, patting the heel of my foot. ‘He’ll come round now. Soon be talking to you again.’ There was the sound of a knapsack being rummaged, then I heard and smelt a pipe being lit. ‘So,’ went on Dick, in between draws, ‘when’s the next attempt? Only a short time left now, you know.’

  ‘No more attempts. Resigned myself to life in the army.’

  ‘Already?’

  ‘No-one else wants me.’

  ‘Poignant, Harry. Very.’

  ‘Besides, I can’t risk another whipping; any more strokes would be hitting bare kidney, and I don’t fancy that.’

  ‘I’ve known men survive a thousand strokes before now. Where’s your bottom, man?’

  ‘Have you been stroked, Dick?’

  ‘Well, no.’

  ‘Shut thy mouth then. And get me a drink of ale. My mouth is as dry as a nun’s fireplace.’

  ‘Twas time, I had decided, to start acting and talking like a soldier if I was to be one. And a great relief it was too – thinking and plotting and dreaming ecstatic dreams of anything, be it fame or escape, was a tiring fruitless business, and I’d had enough of it. Now I could just put my body and brain and soul in the hands of George III, and let him do my worrying for me, at least for the duration of the American war. This change of heart must have become apparent to everyone over the next few days, for as soon as I was well enough I was taken to the quartermaster’s store and kitted out in the regulation uniform, which consisted of a red coat, a cocked hat, a white stock, half-length gaiters, white stockings, white breeches, linen socks and black boots. Issued also with a tin canteen, a knapsack, a haversack, combs, brushes and blankets, I was instantly transformed from creeping Night Poet to brazen Soldier, shockingly conspicuous to all adversaries.

  So, subdued and acquiescent, I knuckled down to my duties, which, thanks to my new attitude, became almost enjoyable. For a couple of weeks, these consisted entirely of learning the dull mechanisms of drill practice, but then I was issued with my very own firelock and bayonet, complete with ammunition pouch and cartridge box, and the world became a brighter place, for I found I had a special knack for impersonalized murder. The technique and ritual involved in loading and firing the musket was very conducive to my temperament, and soon I was spraying balls around with surprising speed and facility. Despite this accomplishment, however, I was never considered good enough to join the elite Grenadier or Light Infantry battalions, scouts of which came round occasionally to claim the better amongst us as their own. Big, brave and handsome recruits, of which in my opinion there were none, were destined for the Grenadiers, there to be heartily backslapped and pumped with over-estimation of their own worth; while small, wiry, witty men ended up in the appropriately-named Light Infantry, to be trained for all sorts of skirmishing and nimble errands when real battle commenced. Hurt at first that I hadn’t been selected for either, I consoled myself with the pleasing reflection that I was too intelligent for the Grenadiers, and too big and handsome for the Light Infantry squirts, thereby falling into an even-more-elite middle category, of which, looking around me, I was the only member.

  Still, this oversight was perhaps a blessing in disguise, because it meant that I could continue the friendship I had struck up with Dick and the boys. For now that Little Bob was talking to me again the camaraderie in our quarters was excellent, and we all played very well together. This esprit de corps particularly manifested itself on company marches, when the open air and the music and the heroic nature of our calling made us feel a cut above ordinary mortals. We even felt superior to our superiors, thanks to their appearance of doing nothing in particular. Indeed, ‘twas not until five days before our departure that I caught my first proper glimpse of our commissioned officers.

  ‘Dick,’ I said, pointing, ‘Who are they coming out of the houses over yonder?’

  Resting at midday in the middle of a pointless ten-mile march, our company was seated on a hill with good views of both the sea and the countryside. Whilst pouring out tepid tea from my canteen, my attention had been caught by the distant barking of a dog.

  ‘Why,’ said Dick, squinting through his pipesmoke, ‘they are our glorious staff officers. We must have stumbled across their nest.’

  I watched fascinated as several little figures emerged stretching and yawning from a row of cottages. All held bottles, and all had a bedraggled air about them, as though they had spent the night in wild debauch. This suspicion was confirmed a few moments later, when wenches appeared in the doorways buttoning up their dresses and shaking their hair free of bedbugs. Everyone stood talking to each other for a while, apparently happy at the night’s work, before pairing off again. Then, carrying hampers between them, they disappeared from view behind a church and a line of poplar trees.

  ‘You look as though you have never seen them before,’ said Dick, rummaging in his knapsack and pulling out a bottle of ale.

  ‘I haven’t.’

  ‘You were not paying attention at your whipping, were you? They were all there, enjoying it every bit as much as the rest of us.’ Dick snorted at an associated memory. ‘Piggy Poo Face indeed. You’re lucky that has not stuck as your nickname.’

  I put my finger to my lips and shushed him, before looking furtively around and changing the subject.

  ‘Who are the women with them?’

  ‘Whores. Can buy some good ones round here for sixpence.’
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br />   I was still mulling over this piece of information when, to my surprise, I saw the officers slowly reappear at the bottom of the hill next to ours. Attention caught once more, I watched as the party levered itself up and settled on the summit like a cloud of aphids. The hampers were opened, snuff was taken, and one could faintly hear the tinkle of glasses and the sound of laughter.

  ‘Not a bad life,’ I observed to Dick.

  ‘That’s it, torture me.’

  ‘Sorry, I forgot that you were part of it yourself once. I didn’t mean it anyway, ‘tis truly decadent what they are doing.’

  I had meant it, as it happened. For a brief moment, like Jesus in the wilderness, I was tortured myself by visions of the soft life that could have been mine had I taken Philpott Hall. My will to be a soldier wavered, so that I had to grit my teeth to prevent Envy rising and swamping me. I was just about to tear my eyes away from the luscious scene when I noticed someone tumbling down the hill, chased by a yapping dog.

  ‘Who on earth is that?’ I exclaimed.

  ‘That’s Pubescent Pete, by the looks of it, and his dog Hartley. Pete’s our second lieutenant, even though he’s only fifteen years old. He’ll be the one marching us to Portsmouth, so I hear.’

  I watched as the youngster got to his feet, ran back delightedly to the top of the hill, and tumbled down again. Those of his elders not too occupied by eating, drinking and drabbing applauded politely.

  ‘His father’s a bigwig, I presume?’ I asked, shaking my head sadly at this wicked abuse of privilege.

  ‘Oh aye. Sir Walter Wriggle, pronounced Regal. A circuit judge famous for his rigid enforcement of the Enclosure Acts.’

  I tutted, and pronounced my verdict.

  ‘Nepotism, Dick. Corruption. To think that our lives are in these people’s hands.’

  ‘Don’t get sniffy about it, Harry. They take the same risks as the rest of us when battle comes. Anyway, I seem to remember that ‘twas Influence that handed you Philpott Hall on a plate.’

  ‘Aye, and ‘twas honesty that made me refuse it.’

  ‘You’d have taken it eventually, had it not been for the intervention of Mr Axelrod.’

  The dreaded name sent a complicated emotion shuddering through me. It still rankled that the rogue had duped me, and had not been to see me since the fateful night, either to apologize or pep me up. On the other hand I had a sneaking admiration for his Devil-may-care attitude to life, and wished that some of it would rub off onto me.

  ‘Aye, well. Better incarceration in the army than incarceration with a mad woman.’

  ‘There’s not much difference, Harry, if you think about it. In both cases your life is likely to be terminated most brutally.’

  ‘Aye, but there’s an end in sight to army life, at least for me. I can’t see the damned Yankees putting up much of a fight.’

  ‘Can’t you?’ snorted Dick. ‘You bloody watch them. They’ll fight their little trotters off the minute they see us. Anyway, come on, ‘tis time to be going.’

  He tapped his pipe out and rose with a rattle of tin, brass and steel. I tossed my tea onto the parched grass and followed suit. Moments later we were in formation again, marching a circuitous route back to the Martyr under the temporary command of an Irish corporal named Michael Sterne.

  I was not reluctant to be off, for even our quarters had taken on a new glow since I had accepted my soldierly fate. This was due, in the main, to Vickie Tremblett, the landlord’s daughter. Now that I was no longer brooding on methods of escape, or too exhausted from the rigours of drill and exercise, I could see that she was indeed beautiful, as my comrades insisted. Petite, with lustrous dark hair, fine features and liquid eyes, she became the leading light of my fantasy world, and I would sit with the others in the tap room waiting for her appearance. When it came, a bombardment of sexual chaffing would begin, but pleasingly Vickie did not respond in kind. She was always friendly and polite, and smiled at their crude jokes, but I sensed that she was keeping her true self in reserve for someone like me – intelligent, sensitive, deceptively strong. Though I dare not talk to her now, because of shyness and fear of ridicule from my comrades, I determined that I would make a bee-line for her hand the moment I came back, a grizzled veteran, from America. Until then, I decided, she would be my Beatrice, a lamp of virtuous and beautiful womanhood shining in the dark, something to live for. As the band stuck up Lillibulero – they seemed to know little else – I began to dream about the luscious night-time feasts that awaited me in the holiness of the marriage bed, and soon I had a definite spring in my step and a lance in my breeches. So certain was I that one day Vickie would be mine, I joined in the whistling with the gusto of a maniac, and nearly deafened Dick in the process.

  ‘Calm down, mate,’ he said. ‘There’s a long way to go yet.’

  This I knew, in more senses than Dick meant, but I was prepared. I was that Soldier of Love.

  7

  To Portsmouth

  We did not arrive at Portsmouth until the morning of our embarkation for New York, meaning that we could only judge the efficacy of the town’s famed nightlife by scrutinizing the faces of the sailors lying unconscious on the cobblestones. We counted thirteen smiling, four indifferent and three clearly horrified countenances, thereby concluding with some bitterness that we had Lost Out. Rueful, we reflected how our last night in England, possibly forever, had been spent tickling piglets in a barn in Bedhampton, while the officers caroused until the early hours in the Wheatsheaf Inn next door. Claude Jepson, reverting to his civilian occupation of yokel, tried to reassure us that one day when we all had wives and children we’d be grateful we didn’t have an opportunity to sow our oats in disease-ridden Portsmouth; and that anyway, cuddling a piglet, with its wet snuffling snout, cute little trotters, wholesome stink and delightful snorting, was infinitely more enjoyable than ravishing a foulmouthed, ginstinking, pockmarked, lousecrawling hag. We considered this argument for a moment, then battered his head soundly for the misconception. For though we sympathized with his porcine notion of happiness, and understood what he meant, we concluded that pipedreams of a contented old age were superfluous when death lurked just around the corner. Army boys have to let off steam, was the general consensus, and there was an end o’ the matter.

  So, some soldiers carrying edible souvenirs of their stay on the farm, we eventually merged with other regiments marching into Portsmouth. Similarly disgruntled, these included the 6th, 37th and 45th Regiments of Foot, the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Artillery and an infantry regiment from Germany, all trailing crowds of women and sutlers in the wake of their baggage trains. We would have scowled silently at each other all morning had not a regiment of dragoons, also entering Portsmouth at that moment, cut through us in a most arrogant manner, thereby providing the icebreaker required. Forced to the side of the road to let them pass, we chuntered solidly about their wicked abuse of privilege, and swigged from our bottles with specious unconcern while the horsemen, dripping with deathshead insignia, snarled and playfully sliced at us with their swords.

  ‘Hope I’m not on the same ship as them,’ said a fellow private from the 45th Foot, ‘scared enough o’ watter as it is.’

  ‘Aye, me too. What regiment are they, do you know?’

  ‘They’re the King’s Dragoon Guards, me duck. Rumour has it that they’ve spent the night razing a place called Southwick, not far from here. Local parson slighted ‘em or summat.’

  It seemed to make sense, for what else would have kept them from a night in Portsmouth? At any rate, they looked like merciless men, and even if the story wasn’t true, it could be. They all had eyes like sharks, and one sensed a cunning behind them that was quite in keeping with their universally feared reputation. I was glancing at the dragoons as they passed, not daring to let my eyes linger, when a bell suddenly rang in my head.

  ‘What regiment did you say they were again?’ I asked the Midlander.

  ‘King’s Dragoon
Guards, me duck.’

  ‘Burnley Axelrod’s regiment!’

  ‘Ah don’t know about that, me duck. Only know ‘tis the King’s Dragoon Guards.’

  On the lookout for the man himself, I stared at the passing faces more boldly, but only received abuse and a slashed tricorne for my pains. Too afraid to ask his whereabouts, I comforted myself with the thought that he was at least in the vicinity. Soon, I was sure, I would be able to confront him face to face; for though now resigned to my fate, I still wanted to speak to him about his actions that night in the Ship. If I could not get an apology out of him, perhaps I could at least get an explanation.

  ‘Right, that’s it,’ came a high-pitched voice, cracking at the edges, ‘they’ve passed. Company, on your feet!’

  We looked up to see Pubescent Pete, glorious in his officer’s array, perched precariously atop a spinning horse. His boyish face, or the part of it that could be seen under his huge hat, was fretful with unaccustomed concentration.

  ‘Come on troops, up I say!’

  Equipment clattering, some men openly sniggering, we rose to Pete’s command and took our positions in the line.

  ‘Left foot forward…and march!’

  ‘See thee in America, me duck,’ called the cheery Midlander, as Bob’s drum and Billy Corden’s fife started up again, ‘or the bottom o’ the sea, whichever comes first.’

  Smiling wan acknowledgement, I marched away, taking care to step around the steaming piles of horseshit that had been contemptuously deposited in front of us. Hartley, Pete’s dog, some sort of Collie and Labrador cross, made progress even more erratic by his playful habit of running amongst us, and butting us in the groin; but eventually we got into some sort of rhythm, and found ourselves advancing through streets lined with ever thicker pockets of popular support.

  ‘Bye bye, lobbies. Fine fertilizers of the soil you boys’ll make!’

  ‘Huzzah for General Washington!’

  ‘Butchers! Scoundrels! Poltroons!’

  A few of the lads responded to the provocation by smashing in the faces of the less vigilant hecklers with the butts of their muskets, but most bore it with good humour. We knew well enough what civilians thought of us by now; just as they knew well enough what we thought of them. ‘Twas all a game, though one that strangely petered out as we neared the bottom of a steep hill.