by Seth Hunter
Bennett frowned. “A proper uniform?”
“I mean a red coat. We have a stack of them in the hold to distribute to the Chouans. You may select your own rank, though you will have to apply to another authority for the pay,” he added hastily.
“I am sorry, sir, to give offence, but I cannot wear a red coat.”
Now Nathan, too, was frowning. “On what grounds?”
“I’d as soon not go into that, sir.”
“For God’s sake, Bennett, you wear the King’s uniform.”
“Even so, sir, it is not a red coat,” he insisted doggedly. “My father would never forgive me.”
Nathan shook his head. “Get out of my sight,” he told him, “before I change my mind.”
But Bennett had put another thought in his head and he was not to be shaken from it, not even by Tully’s worried look when Nathan told him he was going ashore. It was his duty, he insisted, to ensure that the Comte de Puisaye had a proper line of defence before sending other men to join the chaos on the beaches.
He took Bennett, Whitely and six marines.
“Maintain your position as best you can,” he instructed Tully, casting a guilty eye aloft. “And it might be as well to rig the fore topmast staysail when the tide turns to keep the head offshore. Though I should be back well before that.” He was fussing unnecessarily, as Tully must surely be aware: the symptom of a troubled conscience for quitting the ship so close to a hostile shore but it was a virulent affliction and he could not help himself from glancing over towards the gunboats and adding: “And signal Mr. Balfour to give as close support as he is able.”
He was to regret those words later, as much as any words he had spoken in his life, but they seemed insignificant at the time and his mind had already shifted to the practical problems of getting ashore.
He directed his coxswain to land as near to the fort as they dared, for the beach was quite deserted at this point and he trusted that the combination of spray from the breakers and blinding rain would sufficiently dissuade the gunners from trying their luck with a long shot. In this at least his faith was not misplaced and they landed without incident, though thoroughly soaked by the surf and with some misgivings that they would invite a sortie from the fort, for it looked a great deal further to the dunes than it had from the main-top of the Unicorn.
Nathan took Bennett and Whiteley with him, and the six marines, instructing Young to cast off if they came under fire and pick them up further down the shore. Then they ran for the dunes.
They were a little under halfway when a distant report indicated that they had tested the restraint of the gunners beyond endurance. The first shot ploughed into the sand some twenty or thirty yards ahead of them. The second was closer. Nathan shouted for the men to spread out to present less of a target but it seemed to him that the gunners then concentrated their fire upon him, which was as unfair as it was unnerving. One ball hit the sand almost at his heels and he swore he felt the wind of another pass his head. He was not amused to note that a number of figures—Royalists, judging from their uniform—had appeared on the dunes ahead and a little to his left and appeared to be urging him on with broad grins and shouts of approval. Nevertheless he changed direction towards them and managed to reach shelter with nothing more serious to regret than the loss of his dignity.
The gleeful spectators turned out to be the extreme flank of de Puisaye’s elusive lines which were scattered among the sand dunes to the west. They were in better spirits than Nathan had anticipated, though they became somewhat less cheerful when he explained that he had come to reinforce, rather than evacuate them. They had clearly been fortified by a quantity of wine—there were several empty bottles in the sand—and they had two small field pieces loaded with grape and rigged up under an awning to cover the beach. Which might have some effect, Nathan reflected, if they were sober enough to fire it and Hoche threw less than a dozen men against them.
They appeared to be under the command of a sergeant whose long moustaches were more impressive than his grasp of the military situation. Certainly he appeared to have no clear idea where his headquarters were situated, but after some discussion with his men he suggested that General de Puisaye might be found at the small chapel of Lotivy, whose crooked spire could be seen a few hundred yards further along the promontory. Nathan was about to lead his entou-rage off in that direction when Whiteley called urgently down to him from the top of one of the dunes. Nathan went up at a run and threw himself down amidst the swaying stalks of sea grass.
It was clear at once what had attracted Whiteley’s attention. Advancing along the shore from the direction of the mainland was a long column of infantry.
CHAPTER SEVEN
the White Sands
NATHAN TRAINED HIS GLASS on the head of the advancing column. It was led by a single officer on a white horse but there was something odd about the rider’s bearing. His shoulders were slumped, as if in the last stages of exhaustion, and the horse appeared to be led by a man on foot. Indeed, as Nathan moved the glass along the line, he found more anomalies. The slumped shoulders were fairly universal and many of the men appeared to be walking wounded. Head bandages were not uncommon and a number of men were being helped along by their companions. It looked more like an army in hopeless retreat than one embarking upon an attack.
Bennett threw himself down in the grass beside him and Nathan handed him the glass. He took one brief look and said, “It’s Charette.”
“The man on the white horse?”
“No. The man leading it. Charette and the remains of his army.” He returned the glass with a bitter look. They were closer now and Nathan could see women and children marching among the men. They were almost level with the fort but the guns remained silent. Why did they not fire? Was it because of the nature of the target? It seemed unlikely, given the history of this brutal conflict, unless the Republicans were happy to add to the chaos on the beaches.
“Look to the rear!” Whiteley was staring through his own glass. “Coming up behind them.”
Nathan looked and saw the long tailback of blue coats and the steely glint of bayonets. Republican infantry. Marching in a long, steady line at the rear of the retreating Chouans.
“They are using them as a shield!” he exclaimed. He looked searchingly at Bennett. “Does Charette not know they are there?”
The American shook his head, more in perplexity than denial. Nathan took up his glass again and studied the figure at the head of the column. He was much closer now and Nathan saw that he was staring straight ahead with what might be determination or indifference. And then with a shock he saw that the figure on the pony was a woman. Could she be Sara? She was slumped over the pony’s neck and at this distance it was impossible to tell.
Nathan ran down the slope of the dune and found the sergeant commanding the battery. He was befuddled with drink and seemed to have difficulty in understanding what Nathan was trying to tell him. Finally Nathan dragged him bodily up the dune and made him look through the glass. He frowned in bemusement.
“Chouans,” he said with a shrug. Nathan realised he must have seen thousands of them in the last few days, making their way on to the peninsula along the white sands.
“For God’s sake, man, look behind them!” Nathan snatched back the glass and sighted it on the marching column of Blues, though you could see them now with the naked eye. He thrust it back. “Look there, to the rear. You must alert your commanders.”
“I will do it,” said Bennett—and before Nathan could stop him he was gone, off in a shambling run across the dunes toward the distant chapel.
“Bennett!” Nathan called after him but it was futile, his voice lost in the wind and he doubted the man would have heeded him anyway.
Nathan grabbed the sergeant by the arm, squeezing so hard he cried out in pain. “You must wait until the Chouans have passed before you open fire,” he insisted. “Do you understand me?”
The man nodded but there was no comprehension in
his eyes. Nathan shoved him back towards the guns and he lost his footing and rolled down the slope.
“There’s more,” Whiteley sang out, the glass still to his eye, and Nathan saw another long line of men marching out from the fort to join the back of the line. It was hard to calculate how many there were but he would not have said much less than five hundred. Quite enough to turn the Royalist lines if they were not stopped. He looked out to sea. Had Tully seen what was happening? Even if he had, he could do little about it at that range and with so many women and children in his line of fire. But the Conquest and the three smaller gunboats had come in close under their sweeps. And Balfour had his gunports open and the guns run out.
Nathan was filled with a sudden apprehension.
“He cannot mean …” he began tentatively. The answer came upon the instant. The starboard side of the brig erupted in a voluminous cloud of black smoke shot through with flame and the rippling thunder of her 18-pounders rolled back to him across the water as she discharged her entire broadside into the column of refugees.
For a moment Nathan stared as if stricken toward the murderous pall of smoke, swiftly shredded by the wind to reveal the little brig and the still smouldering row of black holes where her guns had been, before the recoil carried them back across her deck. Then his head whipped round to view the devastation she must have wrought upon that crowded shore. At first, it seemed there was none. The ragged column came marching on much as before and he dared hope the heavy seas had confused the gunners’ aim or by some greater miracle they had found their true target among the Republican infantry. But then his eye travelled on toward the rear and he saw the terrible gaps torn in the Chouan ranks. And now the smaller gunboats were firing with the heavy 32-pounder carronades mounted in the bows: firing at musket range towards the rear of the column but with such wild imprecision they must have taken out at least as many women and children as the blue-coated infantry in their wake. They were firing grape, and from Nathan’s vantage on top of the dune he could see the hideous damage it had inflicted, the tight-packed mass of lead spreading out over the distance to cut great swathes in its human target. There were at least a score of corpses scattered along the beach; others sitting wailing in the bloodied sand or dragging their shattered bodies away from the murdering sea. He saw mothers cradling the mangled remains of their children or standing shocked, their mouths forming a soundless scream as they viewed the horrors at their feet. And now the Conquest was coming round to expose her larboard broadside.
Nathan stood at the top of the dune, furiously waving his hat and yelling at the top of his voice for them to cease fire, but they could not possibly have heard him and if they saw him they took his wild capering for encouragement. Down she went in the trough, rolling so wildly he thought she must be swamped through the open ports, and then as she came up she fired, each gun within a half-second of her neighbour and another lethal hail of grape swept the beaches.
All but the head of the Chouan column now broke and scattered, running for the shelter of the dunes. This at least had the effect of isolating the Republican guards who came under fire from the gunboats. It also exposed the full extent of the carnage on the shore and Nathan sank to his knees as the enormity of the atrocity became apparent.
“Oh my God, oh dear God, oh dear God.” He heard Whiteley’s voice beside him, saw his shocked expression. “How can he have done that? How can he have done that?”
“Christ knows,” said Nathan bitterly. He felt sure Balfour had intended to target the infantry but he must surely have known the risk he was taking in such a sea. Then in his numbed skull he heard the echo of his last command before he had left the Unicorn.
“Signal Mr. Balfour to give as close support as he is able.”
Could those ill-considered words have contributed to the tragedy ? Had Balfour felt pressured to take a greater risk than he would other wise have contemplated?
At the very least Nathan felt certain they must have encouraged him to come much closer inshore than he would have dared if left to his own cautious devices.
The head of the Chouan column had halted and faced about, scattering across the beach as they deployed to face the enemy in their rear: all but the woman on the white horse who was riding at a gallop towards the Conquest, sitting upright in the saddle, her hair streaming out behind her like some pagan goddess as if she meant to ride across the waves to deliver some divine retribution. Nathan watched in astonishment as she rode straight into the surf, the horse rearing and plunging in the white breakers, and he saw her raise her arm and the fl ash of an explosion as she fired a pistol toward the brig, and in that gesture of defiance, in the wild dark hair flowing out behind her, he saw Sara.
He turned to Whiteley. “Take your men to the launch,” he uttered hoarsely, “and wait for me there.”
Then he was gone in an awkward stiff-legged run down the side of the dune towards the beach. He heard Whiteley calling after him but he was beyond reason or recall, intent only on reaching that distant figure on the white horse. He began to sprint in a diagonal line across the shore and as he ran he saw that her former escort was rallying the front rank of the Chouans, directing their fire at the Republican troops as they advanced. So, too, were the gunboats, though from his lower vantage Nathan could not see what effect they were having. And then the guns of the fort joined in and he saw the shot smash into the ranks of the Chouans; or rather the effect it had, hurling bodies this way and that. At least two shots ploughed into the sand in front of him but he ran on, regardless. Then a large wave broke over horse and rider and they both went under and only the horse came up, struggling through the white surf toward the shore and Nathan cried out her name, just once, before the cannon on the fort fired a second volley and he saw and felt no more.
PART TWO: THE COURTESANS
CHAPTER EIGHT
Hard Times
LADY CATHERINE PEAKE CROUCHED at the first floor window of her house on Soho Square and watched the two bailiffs retreating in the direction of Seven Dials, their loathsome hound at their heels.
On reflection, she decided that “retreating” was possibly an over-optimistic assumption: their swaggering, if somewhat bandy-legged, progress across the square suggesting rather a brief retirement to the nearest tavern before resuming the assault. Even the beast walked with a swagger, observed Lady Catherine, who was not a dog lover and reserved a particular dislike for the breed of bull terrier which it most resembled, though she was inclined from pure prejudice to doubt its legitimacy.
She felt a rare moment of despair. So it was come to this. A society beauty, a woman of substance, courted in her time by the rich and powerful, a noted feminist and champion of the oppressed, cowering on the floor of a rented house in Soho—which like herself had seen better days—for fear of the bailiffs.
Although she was still counted a beauty and prided herself that most of her acquaintance, even her intimates, would have been astonished to know she was much over forty, Lady Catherine was in fact fast approaching her half century and the future appeared bleak. She made a brief but depressing tally of her current circumstances. She was estranged from her husband, her only son Nathan was in the navy and had not been heard of, at least by his mother, for several months, her once considerable fortune was buried in the ruins of her bank, her family in America was unable or unwilling to help her out—and the enemy was at the gates.
A tentative knock announced the arrival of reinforcements in the form of her companion and lodger, Mrs. Imlay—or rather the head and upper torso of this lady which were inserted into the small gap she had opened between door and frame, her normally handsome features contorted into an anxious frown.
“Have they gone?” she hissed, her eyes searching the room for evidence of the intruders, as if they might even now be concealed behind the Oriental settle before bearing it off to the debtor’s prison, and all who sat upon it.
“They have gone,” Lady Catherine assured her with a sigh. “Izzy has seen
them off, for the time being. I believe it was in the nature of a ‘softening up,’ though it will take more than a couple of bully boys and a bulldog to discompose The Mountain …” Here referring to her maid who was built on the grand scale … “Unhappily I am made of less robust material and need to be fortified with a drink. Come and join me.”
The newcomer advanced wholly into the room, revealing the win-some, if fractious figure of a young child carried upon her hip.
“Oh, Kitty, do not be dismayed,” she ventured, “for you are a tower of strength to us all, and if you are to succumb to the vicissitudes of fortune, what will become of the rest of us?”
The child echoed this sentiment with a whimper.
“Oh for God’s sake, Mary,” Kitty replied with some heat, “you are far more able to withstand the ‘vicissitudes of fortune’ than I or anyone else of my acquaintance, and if there were the slightest danger that you would not, I am persuaded the Corresponding Societies would get up a petition to Parliament.”
She regretted this outburst immediately, though the woman who now joined her at the window was singularly capable of exciting as much irritation as sympathy, or indeed admiration, in Kitty’s volatile breast. Mary Imlay, née Wollstonecraft, was one of her oldest and most esteemed friends, whose book on the Rights of Women had raised her to the status of goddess in the progressive circles to which they were both attached, though more recent experiences had diminished her to a more human condition.
Kitty grimaced in the direction of the child. “Hello, Fanny,” she ventured, with as much warmth as she could muster. The child answered with a sob and buried her face in her mother’s shoulder, which, considering the amount of mucus that had lodged between her nose and upper lip, was probably not the best place for it. On the whole Kitty preferred small children to bulldogs but it was a close run thing. “Would you like a sweetmeat?” she enquired politely, recalling that they had a weakness for such delicacies. “You will find a bowl on the sideboard, I believe,” she instructed its mother. “And also a bottle of gin unless Izzy has used it to unblock the drains. Pour two large glasses and let us drown our sorrows together. Fanny may play upon the floor,” she added generously.