‘Dear, foolish one; what a lovely thought. But I was thinking about Mr. Wicklow. He must have been a very poor lover. I found that out only a few hours ago. Most times with him it was all over before it had hardly started. I much prefer horrid, brutal men like you, who take advantage of trusting young girls and rape them. This is going to be my real honeymoon. Now make love to me again, darling; gently and beautifully and going on for ages and ages, just as you did last night.’
When they got up, Roger cut Mary’s hair to within an inch of her scalp. As it was naturally curly, it only changed her appearance, without lessening her attractions. After she had dressed she looked, as he had hoped, like an impudent young boy. Having packed their things in his valise and the two panniers he had bought to go on her horse, they went downstairs and ate an exceptionally hearty breakfast.
By half past nine they were on the road to Moscow. To Moscow, which they could only hope would be the first stage on the far longer road home.
22
Napoleon Signs his Army’s Death Warrant
Roger had long been accustomed to riding fast and for long distances, so it had taken him only four days to get from Moscow to St. Petersburg. But with Mary he had to amend his pace, and it was six days before they came in sight of such spires and gilded domes as had survived the fires in Moscow.
While in St. Petersburg, Roger had given Mary no details of his secret activities, but on the first morning of their journey he divulged the fact that, for many years, he had led a double life. Later he whiled away many hours telling her what he had really done during the two periods he had been absent from Lisbon, and enthralling her with accounts of his earlier adventures.
They decided that henceforth she was to be known as Hippolyte Abrail, and he would call her Hipé for short. She was to have been born in a suburb of Antwerp, the bastard son of a washerwoman, gone to St. Petersburg as a cabin boy, run away from her ship because she had been very ill-treated by her drunken captain, and got a job as a potboy at the Laughing Tartar, from which Roger had taken her. It was agreed that, in no circumstances, even when alone, should they talk in anything but French.
They had, by exercising great care, escaped molestation by the sotnias of Cossacks and foraging parties of the French which clashed daily in the deep belt of no-man’s-land that formed a semi-circle to the north of the city. Clad again in his uniform, and now with his young servant riding sedately behind him, late on the evening of October 17th Roger dismounted in one of the great courtyards of the Kremlin that was overlooked by the Imperial apartments.
Throwing Mary the reins of his horse, Roger pointed to an archway that led into another courtyard and, as there were several people within earshot, said curtly:
‘The stables are through there. Take our mounts to them, ask for the A.D.C.s’ head groom and hand them over to him to be rubbed down, watered and fed. Then return here and wait until I come out of the Palace. If anyone asks who you are, just tell them that you belong to me. I don’t expect to be much more than three-quarters of an hour.’
As he expected, within a few minutes of sending in his name, a Chamberlain told him that the Emperor would receive him. He found Napoleon holding a conference in his map room; but, on Roger being announced, he abruptly cut short an officer who was speaking, and beckoned Roger to follow him into the next room. The moment they were inside it, he slammed the door and asked harshly:
‘Well! What news do you bring?’
Roger bowed deeply, then sadly shook his head. ‘Alas, Sire, my mission was a failure. I cannot sufficiently express my regret, but the Czar proved adamant. He will not talk of peace, at any price. That is unless and until Your Imperial Majesty withdraws the whole of the Grand Army from his territories.’
Napoleon burst into a spate of curses, using, as he did at times, expressions as filthy as any that could have been heard from a party of drunken troopers who had been robbed of their money in a whore-house. As his pallid face became purple, Roger, who had once had to revive him from an epileptic fit, thought he was going to have another. But after some minutes, he quietened down and, his fine eyes still bulging, angrily blurted out:
‘Why were you so long away? You left here on the 7th. It does not take eleven days to get to St. Petersburg and back.’
‘At first the Czar refused to see me, Sire,’ Roger promptly lied.
‘Then you should have stopped him and spoken to him when he was out for a walk.’
Staggered at this piece of evidence of how far the Emperor’s mind had deteriorated when assessing plausibilities, Roger hid his surprise and replied, ‘I had no opportunity to accost His Imperial Majesty. Fearing that if I took an escort, Cossacks might not respect a flag of truce, but murder the men and myself, I travelled alone and in civilian clothes. In consequence no-one but the Czar would have believed me had I said I was your envoy. Being apparently a person of little account, it took me three days to find a Chamberlain who could be bribed to secure me an audience. I am lucky to have got back alive.’
Pacing up and down, Napoleon began to mutter to himself. When he stopped and again looked at Roger, his shoulders were bowed and there were tears in his eyes. Giving Roger’s ear a tweak, he said with a sigh:
‘Well, Breuc; no doubt you did your best. But I fear that stinking Romanoff has won this round. I’ll make him crawl yet, of course, and burn St. Petersburg about his ears next year. Meanwhile, we must face it that our lines of communication are too long and vulnerable. Find Rapp. Tell him to summon the Marshals and other Corps Commanders for a conference at nine o’clock tomorrow morning. You may go.’
As Roger went off to find the A.D.C.-in-Chief, he almost felt sorry for Napoleon; but quickly put the thought from him. It was absurd to waste one iota of pity on a man who had brought such wholesale misery on the world.
Rapp was in the A.D.C.s’ Mess. There had been very little for them to do since entering Moscow; so, after the fires had been put out and a day or two spent in exploring the city, they had been reduced to whiling away several hours a day at cards. On seeing Roger come through the door, Rapp got up from a table of vingt-et-un, walked over to him and said in a low voice:
‘Welcome back, Breuc. I’m glad those verdamter Cossacks didn’t get you. The King of Naples says they come charging out from every coppice, even against numbers superior to their own. He’s losing scores of his men that way every day.’
‘Our master told you, then, where he’d sent me?’ Roger asked.
‘Yes. He no longer troubles to hide it from those close to him that he’s as jumpy as a cat on hot bricks, and he’s been expecting you back these past three days. When you had still failed to appear yesterday, I told him I feared he might have to go on expecting, but he seemed convinced that as you speak some Russian you’d manage to look after yourself. Did you succeed in seeing the Czar?’
I did, though it wasn’t easy. That’s why I was away for so long.’
‘Have you brought us good news or bad? I’d wager ten to one in napoleons that it’s bad.’
‘Then you’d be ten gold pieces better off. The Czar has got the bit between his teeth. He’s sworn to drive every one of us out of his kingdom.’
I felt sure of it and, if the wits of you-know-who hadn’t become addled, we’d have been out of this accursed city a month ago. Teufel-nochmal! What a mess he’s made of this campaign! First he kicks his heels in Vilna for eighteen days, then for sixteen at Vitebsk, then for fourteen at Smolensk; and we’ve been here for over five weeks. What a way to fight a war! We could easily have got here by the first week in August instead of mid-September. It was crazy to come on here so late in the year. We ought to have wintered at Smolensk.’
‘It was crazy to invade Russia anyhow,’ Roger replied. ‘Even if we’d won and forced a peace on the Czar, he wouldn’t have carried out its terms, and we couldn’t have made him. Russia’s not like Holland or one of the German States. It’s too vast for any army to hold down, and with our old commitments we are o
ver-extended already.’
The Alsatian nodded. ‘That’s what everyone is saying. From the Marshals down to the drummer boys, everyone is asking the same question. “What the devil are we doing here? There’s naught to be gained, so why the hell can’t the so-and-so let us march home?” Now you’ve brought him this final fart in the face from the Czar, I take it we’ll be packing up tomorrow.’
‘We will, unless he qualifies for a strait-jacket. He ordered me to tell you to summon all our military Dukes who are available, for a conference at nine o’clock in the morning.’
‘Good. I’ll do that. Did you have a good time in St Petersburg?’
Roger grinned. ‘It meant a pleasant change of fare, anyhow. For dinner on my last night there I had caviar, borsch, a bear steak and a jam omelette.’
Donnerwetter! And with several nights there, I’ll wager you found one or more pretty bottoms to smack after you’d got all that good food inside you.’
Roger gave a slight wink. ‘As a matter of fact, I’ve brought one back with me, but not the kind of whom you’re thinking. He’s a young Flemish lad, and on the way home, when the cold sets in, he’ll serve as a fine hotwater bottle.’
‘I didn’t know you were one of those,’ Rapp remarked in mild surprise.
‘Not habitually,’ Roger laughed. ‘But variety is the spice of life. The sort of women I care for are not to be had on this kind of campaign. And if I’d brought a girl she would soon have become an annoying liability; whereas this youngster will make himself useful as my servant.’
Roger had been very loath to let his friends believe him to be a homosexual, but he had decided that it was the only way that he could give Mary maximum protection. When it got round that Hipé was his ‘girl’, no-one would dare bully her. And few people would think the worse of him; for on long campaigns in which few women were available, homosexual relationships, although officially frowned upon, were by no means unusual. By this device, too, his companions would not think it strange if he spent much more time with Mary than he would have with an ordinary soldier servant.
Giving a little shrug, Rapp said, ‘There’s a lot in what you say, if one cares for that sort of fun. How about a drink?’
‘Not for the moment, thanks. I have to see Sergeant Loriel about putting my young protégé on the strength for rations.’
A few minutes later he was saying to the Mess Sergeant, ‘This youth I have taken on is a pleasant lad, but I don’t think he is the sort who could stand up for himself very well, and I won’t have him bullied. In fact, I’ve ordered him to let me know if anyone makes things unpleasant for him, and if anyone does I’ll come down like a ton of bricks on them. But I’m sure I can leave it to you, Sergeant, to keep a fatherly eye on him.’
Roger had always treated his inferiors with an easy politeness, so he was popular with the N.C.O.s with whom he had to deal. The Sergeant replied at once, ‘Aye, Colonel; you leave it to me. Tell him to come to me and make his number, and I’ll take good care of him.’
Leaving the Mess, Roger walked down several long corridors to the Camp Commandant’s office. There he told one of the soldier-clerks that he had taken on a civilian servant whom he desired to sleep in his room, and said that a palliasse was to be sent there at once for the youth to doss down on.
Retracing his steps, he went down the magnificent grand staircase and ran into Duroc, who was on his way up. The Marshal of the Palace hailed him with evident pleasure, then said, ‘Mon vieux, I am delighted to see you. The Emperor told me of the mission on which he sent you, and I feared you lost to us. I only pray that you were successful.’
Roger shook his head. ‘Nay, the Czar proved adamant. There’s to be a conference tomorrow at nine, and my bet is that afterwards we’ll be ordered to pack up and go.’
Glumly Duroc observed, ‘If that is so, ’twill be none too soon. The days are shortening and, unless we make good speed, winter will be upon us. But we should have time to get back to Smolensk before the blizzards.’
‘With luck, we should. But what then? We left the city in ruins, so will be little better off there than we are here.’
‘At least we will be the best part of four hundred kilometres nearer the Polish frontier, so supplies will reach us with greater ease.’
‘If Kutuzov lets them. I gather that he now has an army that in numbers exceeds ours.’
‘Ah! That’s the rub. But as we retreat we’ll pick up reinforcements. The corps of Oudinot and Macdonald and Schwarzenberg’s Austrians could be called in. That would again give us parity with the Russians.’
‘Should we do that, how are we to feed such a host all through the winter months?’
‘God knows, mon ami! God knows! We can only hope that Victor and St. Cyr will succeed in keeping our lines of communication open so that sufficient supplies will reach us. Augereau should be able to send several divisions across the frontier from north Germany, to assist in maintaining our hold on Vilna and Vitebsk.’
‘Should we denude Germany, I’ll warrant that country will blow up behind our backs.’
‘To replace the garrisons there, His Majesty might decide to withdraw further troops from Spain.’
‘Could he afford to do so? Are things going better in the Peninsula?’
‘Alas, no. Suchet alone seems to have read the Spanish riddle, and Valencia remains peaceful under him. Soult has again fallen back on Seville, and has come no nearer to taking Cadiz. As you must have heard, after the fall of Badajoz, poor Marmont was heavily defeated outside Salamanca, and grievously wounded by a cannon ball. He brought his defeat upon himself by being too impetuous. Had he waited but another three days before giving battle, he would have had under his hand another fifteen thousand men that King Joseph was bringing up from Madrid. As things were, he came near to losing his whole army. It was only owing to the skill displayed by General Clausel, who took over after Marmont became a casualty, that a good part of the army was saved. But it received a terrible battering and, even with King Joseph’s fifteen thousand, was in no condition to give battle again. Our latest information is that our people are still retiring, and milord Wellington advancing on Madrid.’
To Roger this was excellent news, but he naturally concealed his pleasure at hearing it, and simply said, ‘Then things go really badly for us at both ends of Europe, and I know not in which army I would rather have to face the future. But you must excuse me now. Having but just returned I have a number of things to see to.’
His several conversations had each lasted only a few minutes. Mary was standing where he had left her, and he took her across to another big building in which his room was situated. All he wished to do for the moment was to show her where it was, and make certain she could find it again. When he had done so, they walked back the way they had come and into the main block. There he led her up to the second floor and along to the room in which the Mess waiters had their quarters. Halting outside, he told her to go in, ask for Sergeant Loriel and tell him who she was. She would then be given supper, and when she had finished it she was to go to their room.
The next thing he had to do was to deal with the soldier servant, a man named Greuze, who had looked after him since he had rejoined Napoleon at Vilna. Walking back to his quarters, he found Greuze there, unpacking his valise and the panniers from Mary’s horse, which had been brought up from the stables by his groom. Greuze was a lad of only seventeen, and Roger had selected him from a number of applicants, because he came from a respectable family, so kept himself clean, and was by no means robust. For the latter reason Roger did not want to send him back to normal duty, which would mean a much harder life for him; so, having returned the lad’s greeting, he said:
‘While I was away from Moscow, I acquired another servant, a Flemish youth named Hipé Abrail. He has worked as a valet in a good hostelry, so will look after my clothes better than you can.’
Seeing Greuze’s face fall, he went on with a smile, ‘But that is a private arrangement, and I am sti
ll entitled to a soldier servant, so I intend to keep you on. My new lad is having supper now. He will be over here in half an hour or so. When he comes in, you are to show him where you keep your cleaning things, and tell him about the routine we normally follow. Then you can go to your quarters. After you have cleared up here, I’ll not need you until tomorrow morning.’
Having established Mary in her new position in a way that he hoped would protect her from unpleasantness, he went back to the Mess and had a drink with Rapp. Soon afterwards they went in to supper and, as Roger had expected, he found himself the centre of interest. All his companions wanted to know about his journey and what St. Petersburg was like. Sitting over their wine, they continued to ply him with questions but, as soon as he decently could, by pleading fatigue, he got away.
In his room he found Mary, not in bed as he had expected, but curled up under a blanket on the straw palliasse that he had ordered to be brought. When he asked her why she had not made herself more comfortable, she said:
‘I didn’t dare undress and get into bed, in case that nice young servant of yours came back, or someone else came in.’
‘You could have locked the door.’
She shook her now boyish head. ‘No, darling. Servants don’t lock themselves in their master’s rooms. Anyone finding I had done that would have thought it very queer.’
‘You’re right,’ he agreed. ‘And I was stupid to suggest it. Bless you for starting off in your new role so conscientiously. How did you get on with Sergeant Loriel?’
‘Very well. And with the others, too. They made me tell them about St. Petersburg and said I was a fool ever to have left it. But they were very pleasant to me, and think me lucky to be your servant. It’s nice to know that you are so popular with the Mess orderlies.’
‘Oh, that’s only because I am civil to them, and many officers don’t bother to be.’
The Ravishing of Lady Mary Ware Page 33