by Tony Roberts
This is a book of fiction. All the names, characters and events portrayed in this book are Fictional and any resemblance to real people and incidents are purely coincidental.
CASCA: #30 Napoleon’s Soldier
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Copyright © 2009 by Tony Roberts
Cover design by Damian Leigh
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Table of Contents
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
EPILOGUE
Continuing Casca’s adventures, book 31 The Conqueror
PROLOGUE
Death came to the village of Mała Wolka in the late spring of 1812. There had been no warning, no sign that it was going to happen. The villagers had no inkling that morning as they toiled on the land that this day would be any different to those they had always had.
Rumors of war had come to them from neighboring villages and from gossip at the market places in the town fifteen miles away, but the villagers paid no attention to it; war had always passed them by and they were of no importance for there was nothing here for anyone. Nothing that was, except for the beautiful church icons their village chapel possessed, but the building was so unremarkable that nobody paid any attention to it.
Head villager Marek Włodziak was called out of his log house by one of the children close to midday, the high pitched excited voice announcing that soldiers were approaching up the single dirt track that served as the only way into and out of the village. Włodziak, a middle-aged peasant, frowned as he watched the approaching ragged column of men. What were they doing here? The main roads were to the north and nobody normally came here!
The soldiers, dressed in white and blue and sporting tall, black shako hats, kicked up clouds of dust as they approached. Their guns were all smartly pressed against their shoulders and many wore mustaches. They were sweating in the heat of the day. Włodziak couldn’t count but he didn’t think they amounted to much. It wasn’t an army and it wasn’t a large body of men; they must be a patrol.
At the head of the group of soldiers was a burly, bearded, dark haired man with a broad, flattened nose and thick, sensuous lips. His chest threatened to burst out of the uniform and his arms were thick and strong. He was hot, tired, hungry and in an extremely bad mood. He had become fed up with the constant marching of the column without a pause and had peeled off to go look for food and other interesting items. The men with him had joined in, agreeing that the main army was marching far too much, and as they had been at the rear of the column they’d been getting the worst of the dust and were as a result glad of the break. It looked like nobody had noticed they had gone, so they were confident they could come and go as they pleased. The church spire on the horizon had guided them and so they came to Mała Wolka, a village so small that it wasn’t even on any of the army maps.
Włodziak ran to the village pump which served as the focal point of the square. The church was to one side and the village hall the other. The rest of the buildings were a collection of rude huts made of wood and earth. “Greetings - Cześć!” he said, his thick mustache twitching with apprehension. “We are a poor people but please wait while we fetch you bread and salt!”
Bread and salt was the traditional Polish country people’s way of greeting strangers. The soldiers came to a halt and looked about at the buildings with interest. This was the first place they’d seen in a couple of days, and the growing gaps in between places of inhabitance the further they had marched east had begun to depress them. “Well,” the burly man said, un-slinging his musket, “let’s see what food we can find in this shithole.”
The men laughed and broke up, heading for separate doorways. The villagers stood uncertainly, not knowing what was going on. Włodziak waved his hands in protest. “Please! No, we are a poor people and have nothing for you!”
The soldiers didn’t understand a word and the burly man shoved the villager roughly aside. “Stop gibbering you filthy peasant. You must have something of value here,” he made for the church. It wasn’t much of a church but being of stone and possessing windows, it stood out amongst the rest of the buildings. The soldier pushed open the door and sauntered in, his eyes taking a few moments to adjust to the darkness. His eyes alighted on the colorful icons on the altar and his mouth broke open in glee. “Oh! Treasure!”
Włodziak came in and ran in front of him. “No! This is sacred!”
The soldier grabbed the villager and threw him aside. “I’m taking what I want,” he growled.
At that moment Włodziak’s fifteen year old daughter came in, attracted by her father’s shouts. She saw the soldier making for the altar and shrieked in outrage. The soldier stopped and turned to see the long-haired girl run past him to the altar and block his route. The soldier laughed. “Well, a fair maiden willing to sacrifice herself to a soldier of France. So much the better!”
Other men came in and saw the burly soldier pin the girl against the altar and reach out to take an icon, a small beautifully decorated silver and gilt bejeweled mini cross, one of a pair. The girl cried out in fury and snatched it from him. Immediately the man slapped her across the face, a vicious backhander that shook the girl and brought her to her knees. Włodziak howled in outrage and attacked the man, flailing him with his fists. The soldier turned and closed his hands round the headman’s throat. “Now you stupid peasant, you die.”
It wasn’t the first time the soldier had killed a defenseless man, and he squeezed the life out of the helpless Włodziak. The soldiers by the door stood, not knowing what to do. They were afraid of the strength and temper of the bigger man. As the body of the headman hit the floor the killer turned to pull the still stunned girl up and ripped her simple dress apart. “Now, you pretty little butterfly,” he growled, “you will serve me.”
He pushed her onto the altar and unfastened his breeches. The girl was coming round and began to struggle, so she received a second blow that knocked any fight out of her. Her legs were pulled apart and the two soldiers by the door shuffled uncomfortably. “Go find yourselves some other bitch to satisfy yourselves on, you cretins,” the burly soldier snapped, twisting his head round to glare at them, not stopping his thrusting. “This one’s mine and mine alone!”
The girl groaned and received another hefty blow to her head. She shuddered once and flopped listlessly against the altar, her eyes unfocussed. Almost in a reflex motion, her hand clenched the icon she held, as if to hold o
nto something during her ordeal.
Outside, the other soldiers were ransacking the village, searching for food. The cry went up that the church was being pillaged and three of the braver men ran towards the building, but they were stopped by a knot of the French soldiers and received bayonets through their guts. Now the screaming started and the butchery began. Once the blood lust had been raised, there was little the villagers could do to stop it. Women cried out for mercy, begging their children be spared, but the furious soldiers turned a deaf ear to their voices, for there were no officers to stop them. The cries brought those tilling the fields in, and they were armed with spades, forks and other digging implements, but these were no match for bayonets and muskets. A few shots rattled out and the slaughter continued.
Inside the church the burly soldier had finished and pulled his trousers – his culottes – up and grunted in satisfaction. The girl moaned slightly, her head lolling. Her eyes flickered open and the first thing she saw was the corpse of her father lying on the cold, hard floor. “Tato!” she whimpered.
The soldier laughed nastily and strutted into view. “Your papa, eh? Well he’s dead, my little flower.” He saw the second icon on the altar and picked it up, examining it closely. It was in the form of a cross, made of silver and inlaid with small gems. The main body of the cross was enameled in red and was about the size of his palm. He slipped it into his tunic and remembered the girl had taken the other one. “Give me that cross,” he ordered.
The girl shook her head, and the soldier, in fury, slammed his fist into her face twice, knocking her out. He went to open her hand when fresh shots outside stopped him. Shouts went up and he heard horses’ hooves. He cursed; none of his men had horses. He ran to the door, picking up his musket and peered through the opening.
The village was a maelstrom of cuirassiers - French cavalry - and officers were barking orders to round up the infantrymen who had committed the atrocities evident to their shocked eyes. New infantry were marching up the road, disciplined and under command. The burly soldier cursed again and pushed the door shut and looked around the interior for another way out. A second door caught his eyes, standing to one side of the altar. He ran to it and pulled it open. It led to a room, one with priest’s garments. A window offered a way out, six feet up, so the solider grabbed a bench and dragged it to a point underneath the window and unlatched it, climbing up and forcing his bulk through it, grunting in effort and cursing his luck.
In the village the infantry had arrived and were ordered to round up the filthy cochons who had defiled the Polish villagers, and to find any survivors. One of their number, a scarred hard looking man, took one glance at the dead villagers and sucked in his breath. He’d seen far too many sights in his long lifetime but no matter how many times he saw such, it always enraged him. War was war but why take it out on women and children? Poland was France’s ally. They were marching east to Russia. These idiots deserved the firing squad.
“Longue, go check that church,” snapped Caporal Jean-Paul Auvrey, a smooth skinned stocky man, his rank insignia of two yellow bands on his sleeves denoting his authority.
Longue nodded and pulled the sleeve of his companion, a slim, wiry man with a clipped beard and long nose, to accompany him. Longue held his musket in one hand and pushed the church door open. One look was enough. A dead man on the floor and another probable corpse on the altar, a girl by the look of it. “Shit,” he muttered. He ran over to the girl and noted the torn clothing and blood on her inner thighs. She’d clearly been raped.
He checked her pulse. Faint. She was still alive! He bent and caught a puff of breath. He opened one of the girl’s eyes. The girl gasped and both eyes fluttered open. Longue smiled encouragingly at her. “Don’t fear - Nie boje się” he said softly in Polish, being a man adept and well versed in many tongues, “I won’t harm you.”
“Tato,” she whispered. Longue turned to see his compatriot examining the man. The soldier shook his head sadly.
Longue gripped her hand and was surprised to find she was clutching an object. It was too large to be entirely hidden, and he saw it was some kind of religious symbol. “H-He took the other one,” the girl gasped. “It must be returned or the village will never be the same again!”
“I will, I promise,” Longue said, his face serious. “It’s identical to that one?”
The girl nodded weakly and her hand opened. “Promise on the icon, to God, you will return it to this church!”
“I promise - Ja obiecam,” Longue repeated. It was a beautiful object. Any poor soldier would make a fortune with it. The girl relinquished the cross and sighed deeply, shuddered, then fell still. Longue caught the cross as it slipped out of her fingers and slid it into his pocket before the other man saw it. He stroked the face of the now dead girl. “I promise,” he repeated in Polish.
The two men came out of the church and rejoined the rest of the men who were now being organized into rows of ten. The arrested soldiers were pleading for mercy, but the corpses of the men, women and children of the village hardened the officers’ hearts and they snapped impatient orders to their own soldiers to line up and load against the idiot infantry.
Longue was thrust into one squad together with his comrade, Maurice Paradis, and the two hastily loaded up their Charleville muskets. In front of them was pushed one gibbering individual, hatless, sobbing in terror. “Please citizens, please, I’m a good republican! I didn’t mean to do this! It was the big man, the one who went into the church! He led us!”
Longue heard his words. “What was his name?” he asked the shaking man.
“H-He called himself The….” He said something which was drowned out by a series of shots as one of the prisoners was executed “….. Rose, that’s all he told us!”
“The what Rose?” Longue demanded, holding the prisoner by the arm. A lieutenant came up and grabbed the prisoner and thrust him against one of the huts. Longue cursed, and tried to delay the execution. “Sir, a big man led them; he’s not with these prisoners. Perhaps we could use this man to identify their leader?”
“Carry on, private,” the lieutenant snapped peremptorily. “We’ll catch whoever it was! These dogs were supposed to join our regiment. They have shamed us all. They are all to die.”
Longue decided this moron of an officer wasn’t worth discussing the subject with any further. Unimaginative. The order came to aim and Longue and Paradis and their eight colleagues raised their muzzles. “Au fer!”
Ten shots blasted out and the condemned soldier jerked, spun, and fell to the ground, his white tunic spattered with red. Longue dropped the barrel and gazed at the body without pity. Other shots rattled out round the village and the other prisoners were executed without exception. Longue grunted to himself. All except the ‘big man’. He’d promised to return the cross, and by all the gods, he’d do it, even if it took him centuries. Centuries were nothing to him. He’d lived eighteen of them already. He was Casca Rufio Longinus, former Roman soldier who’d speared Jesus on the cross and had been cursed to immortality for that action.
Casca was for the moment a member of Napoleon’s army, a revolutionary, bringing Liberté, Egalité and Fraternité to the oppressed people of Europe, even if they didn’t want it. He no longer believed in the revolution, but for the moment it paid and he was a soldier, and wherever there were wars he’d find employment. For now he’d taken the name Casca Longue, and was a proud member of Prince Eugène’s Army of Italy.
As they began the grisly task of burying the dead, Casca checked the landmarks. Precious few, he noticed. The land was flat, and no landmarks really came to mind, except perhaps the distant dip on the horizon directly east where the sun stood directly above. He grunted. He’d have to come back to this point at the same time of year – May – in order to find it again. No doubt the buildings would fall down so they would vanish. The church would last longer, but in time it would too fall into ruin.
The burials didn’t take too long and Casca rejoined h
is unit, the 3rd battalion of the 84th regiment of line of Brigadier Huard’s, which in turn was part of the 13th division under General Delzons. The orders came and smartly they turned about and marched off to rejoin the main body of the Army of Italy (now renamed the 4th corps) that was making its way east towards the Russian frontier.
They left behind a cemetery where once a village had lived. They all put out of their minds the poor villagers. All except of course Casca. One day he’d return, he knew he would, and when he did he’d fulfill his vow to the dead girl. And kill the bastard who’d done the evil deed.
CHAPTER ONE
The army camped to the east of Ostroleka, close to the Nieman River; the body of water that formed the boundary between the Russian Empire of Tsar Alexander, and that of ‘Congress’ Poland, satellite of Napoleon Bonaparte’s French Empire.
They gratefully received new rations, brought to them from Kovno to the north, the great depot on the border, and set about cooking great volumes of stew in the camp cauldrons. Casca sat cleaning his musket, next to Maurice Paradis. “Nasty business,” Casca said, concentrating on the barrel.
“What is?” Paradis asked, frowning. He was wiping his bayonet even though it didn’t need it. He had to look busy or Caporal Auvrey would find him work to do.
“That business back in that village. Those poor villagers. What possessed those fools to do that?” Casca wanted to hear Paradis’ opinion. His comrade had been quiet since they’d shot that pillager.
“Who knows?” Paradis shrugged in a very Gallic manner, pulling a severe face. “Maybe they were hungry?”
Casca snorted. “Not hungry enough to rape and steal! Believe me,” Casca pointed east, “this lot will know hunger once they set off over there!”
Paradis looked up from concentrating on his bayonet. “What is out there in Russia? Do you know?”
Casca nodded. “I’ve been in Russia before, a long time ago. They’re even poorer there than here. Long distances between each village, and endless plains. We’ll need a decent supply train for the campaign, but I don’t think Napoleon really appreciates how far it is. We’ll lose thousands to desertion, mark my words.”