At first, the young lieutenant was secretly thrilled by the news, which he learned from the commander's own lips.
'She did not want to go back to Sagoyewatha,' he said, unable quite to conceal his delight. 'She wanted us to go and live together far away in the north, in the secret place which was the refuge of her father's tribe before the massacre.'
'And you think, do you, that she has gone there alone – that she may be waiting for you there?'
'Why not? She was as sure of me as I am of her.'
'Sure of her? Oh, youth! It gives me no pleasure to tell you what I am about to, my poor friend, but I owe it to myself to help you erase even the shadow of regret from your heart. Do you know what my spies in Indian territory have told me? The wife of Sagoyewatha the wise, the woman for whom you would have renounced everything, even your own blood, has not gone to the great northern forests where the Algonquin once lived but only as far as the Mohawk valley – and Cornplanter's camp fires!'
Gilles was speechless, too stricken to do or say a thing. Never for one moment did it occur to him to doubt the General's word. The name of the Iroquois chief had struck him like a death blow and made him dumb. He could only shake his head and then, turning without even a bow, rush from the room, almost knocking over La Fayette and General Knox who were just entering.
'Good God!' the Frenchman exclaimed. 'Was that Lieutenant Goëlo? Where is he off to so fast? He looked as though he'd seen a ghost.'
Washington, who had followed him to the threshold, shrugged his shoulders and smiled sadly.
'The ghost of his last illusion, my dear Marquis. I have just severed him from a woman he held dear.'
'Aha! The famous Indian princess you had in keeping at the minister's house and whom he managed to make his mistress nonetheless?'
'Now, how do you know that?'
The marquis laughed. 'When there's a pretty woman in the case I always make it my business to know everything. A little talent, if you like, General, that belongs very much to my country. Unfortunately, I never so much as set eyes on her.'
'I'm sorry for your sake, for she is remarkably lovely. Like a magnificent wild cat. But the boy is a thoroughbred also and I should not like him to do anything foolish.'
'I shouldn't think he would. I saw him fight when we were nearly taken by the English. He's a real brave! All the same, I'll go in search of him after we've had our orders from you.'
Gilles had not in fact gone very far. He had run out without looking where he was going, like the wounded deer relying on the undergrowth to drag the arrow from its side, but when he came to the inn with its sign illustrating the name, the Grand Washington, he pulled up short. His first thought had been to dash down to the Hudson and plunge in once and for all. But the brightly coloured inn sign with its idealized portrait of his chief made him change his mind. The thought of Sitapanoki going straight from his arms to those of Cornplanter made him feel sick with disgust but even so he was not going to destroy himself for that, like a pregnant housemaid abandoned by her lover.
'Women!' he spat out, grinding his teeth. 'Like a bitch on heat! Surely no Tournemine ever killed himself for such a cause! If you mean to drown yourself, my boy, you might as well do it in rum.'
With that he wheeled round and, rushing headlong through the door, plonked himself down at a table and, roaring loudly for a bottle, set himself to get thoroughly and systematically drunk.
It was there that General La Fayette and one of his adjutants, Colonel Poor, found him a couple of hours later. He was magnificently drunk and standing on a table surrounded by a hilarious circle of infantrymen who were clapping their hands to mark time while he sang, at the top of his voice, one of the sea shanties that all Bretons knew from infancy.
'Chantons, pour passer le temps
Les amours jolies d'une belle fille
Chantons pour passer le temps
Les amours jolies d'une fille de quinze ans...'
The soldiers were trying to pick up the choruses but could make nothing of the French words and since liberal potations of rum had done nothing to improve their leader's voice the resulting cacophony was enough to make La Fayette screw up his face in anguish.
He was too well known not to be able to obtain an instant silence but persuading Gilles to descend from his table proved somewhat more difficult. The Breton announced that he was going to stay there in order to deliver a bitter tirade against the faithlessness of women. With the help of Poor and two of the men, the marquis got him down soon enough only to have the unaccustomed tope cast himself into his arms weeping like a fountain and calling him his 'dear, po-faced, little General', which left the last descendant of the La Fayettes deeply puzzled but highly amused.
There was nothing more for him to do but to have the lieutenant conveyed to his tent and put to bed, where he began to snore at once.
'Well, he'll do there until morning,' the marquis said with a sigh. 'But what the devil possessed the boy to go falling in love with a redskin?'
'I caught a glimpse of her as she was leaving,' Colonel Poor said, 'and, if you want my opinion, I think General Washington was wise to keep her out of sight of the men. She would have set the whole army on fire.'
'Whew! You'll make me sorry I didn't see her myself. I'm beginning to understand young Goëlo – and envy him!'
Gilles, when he woke, felt that there was no one in the world less to be envied than himself. He had a throat like wood and a distinct impression that the end of the world was at hand. What was more, when he ventured to put his head outside his tent, he saw that it was raining hard and the whole camp had become a sea of mud. He had, however, sense enough not to allow the memory of Sitapanoki's treachery to return to haunt him. For though the emotional side of his love might be foundering in scorn and disgust, that did not make him forget the nights of passion he had spent with her. He still had to get over his desire for her.
When he had stopped feeling quite so sick and the sun seemed to be standing more or less still again, he went, very properly, to render thanks to La Fayette for his solicitude, which he had been aware of even through the fumes of alcohol. He was able to do this without the slightest embarrassment, for undertaking the New York expedition in his company had given him a juster estimate of the young general who had been such a figure of romance to him in Vannes and such a disappointment at Rhode Island. For all his squeaky voice and the element of complacency in his character, the Marquis from Auvergne was not without charm. Gifted with exquisite manners and an unfailing courage, he was also wholly without false pride. In addition, he had the knack of winning people to him and, apart from Washington who treated him like a son, he had acquired the blind devotion of the two thousand-odd men, regular soldiers and half-wild militiamen, who made up his brigade. He certainly looked after them like a mother, spending his own money without stint – he was one of the richest men in France – to keep them properly equipped. Madame La Fayette was continually receiving letters full of endearments and requests for money. As for the fine ladies of Philadelphia, where Washington was always sending him to practise his cajolery, he had talked them into sewing endless shirts and knitting mountains of stockings for his 'legion'. He made no secret of his fondness for women in general, but this in no way interfered with his love for his own wife in particular.
'Don't apologize,' he told his lieutenant when that young gentleman presented himself before him. 'I did exactly the same thing myself before I left France. I was madly in love with a very beautiful lady but I was not the only one and so she spurned me. I downed many a bottle of old burgundy in the effort to forget her. How do you feel this morning?'
'Ashamed, angry – and itching for a fight. Preferably against the Iroquois.'
'Excellent! But I can't myself feel much interest in the Iroquois when there is this splendid collection of British and Hessians just waiting for us to make mincemeat of them. If I may say so, sir, I begin to like you more and more.'
'And I you, General. Only pe
rmit me to remind you that I never knew my father and that the name I bear is my mother's.'
"Why should I be nicer in that respect than General Washington? In this country, one man is as good as another.
Besides, we each of us come of an ancient race very far from the Frankish invaders who gave their name to our country. You are a Breton, which is to say a Celt, and I am an Auvergnat and so a Gaul.'
'A Gaul?'
'So I devoutly hope and believe because there were very few Franks who settled in the mountains of Auvergne. I prefer Vercingetorix, defending his mountain fastnesses, to the brigand Clovis and his abominable successors.'
'But—' Gilles said, startled, 'but those abominable successors were—'
'The kings of France and most of their associates? I know. I do not care for kings, sir, and what I came here for was a lesson in liberty. And I will tell you this as well. My grandfather, the Marquis de la Riviere, is one hundred per cent Breton. So let us shake hands and then go and see what kind of task we can talk General Washington into giving us. I am like you, I want to be away from here.'
But although La Fayette, supported by his staff, urged and pleaded with him, Washington refused steadfastly to let himself be drawn into ill-timed attacks on the outer defences of New York. In vain did the Marquis insist that vigorous action would spur the French King's ministers to further generosity; the American had no desire to get his men killed when he had been at such pains to keep them alive.
'If we can hold the positions we have already won all winter, that will be very well. In any case, we need fresh reinforcements. The Comte de Rochambeau has told me that his son has returned to Versailles on board the Amazone, under the command of M. de La Pérouse, to ask for another fleet to be sent. The English have sailed from Newport at last but the Chevalier de Ternay still has too few ships to guard the main river outlets and complete the blockade of New York. We must wait.'
Wait! Wait! It was not a word that either La Fayette or his new lieutenant liked to hear. They did, however, succeed at last in obtaining permission to launch a night attack on two of the Hessians' camps and left them badly mauled.
But before long, they had to face a new enemy. Winter fell on them suddenly, half-way through the autumn, and set in for good. It buried the whole continent at a stroke, and the usual, marvellous respite of Indian summer was not granted to them this year. Whirling snowstorms hid the great forests, smothered towns and villages and laid a heavy silence over all, while the rivers froze over all the way to the sea where the waters in the great bays of Chesapeake and New York were white and crusted.
Then, as Washington had foreseen, both armies began to suffer, but the Rebels especially. They had few reserves and no money to buy what was needed. Officers and men alike ate bread made of a mixture of buckwheat, rye, wheat and maize, when there was any and the time soon came when they might go three days, not only without meat, for there was little enough of that except when the hunting was good, but even without bread. Their clothes were no better and a nourishing black market grew up.
The French, established behind the newly rebuilt defences of Newport, were slightly better off, but the provisions which had been brought from France were all gone by now and the generals were obliged to buy in food for the troops at exorbitant prices. They were waiting impatiently for news from France, for Rochambeau had asked, not merely for more men and the twenty-five millions needed by Washington, but for an unbelievable quantity of other things, from six thousand shirts, ten thousand pairs of shoes to three thousand sacks of flour, two dozen copper stoves and six dozen enema syringes. But Versailles seemed to have forgotten all about the army on the other side of the world and answers were infrequent.
Both armies passed the time as best they could, solidly entrenched in their own positions and making no attempts at hostile demonstrations which were, in any case, rendered impossible by the weather. Only La Fayette made frequent journeys to Philadelphia to prevail upon congressmen and their wives to contribute, willy nilly, to the war effort. In this way he successfully acquired much that was needed.
On Christmas Eve, Tim Thocker arrived at headquarters, gliding in on his snow shoes like a gull on the water. But he brought sad news. At daybreak on the fifteenth of December the French flagship, the Duc de Bourgogne, had hauled her flags to half mast and braced her yards in sign of mourning, while her guns began to sound under the grey sky. Soon the other ships of the fleet had followed suit. The high and puissant seigneur Charles-Henri-Louis d'Arsac, Chevalier de Ternay, Chevalier de Malte, Admiral of the King's Fleet had died at half past five in the morning, two hours before dawn.
The news came as a shock to Washington who had conceived a great admiration for the greatness of the gallant, taciturn little admiral, who was so often the butt for his junior officers.
'Is it known how he died?' he asked the messenger.
'I was told of a putrid fever but there was some talk of an inflammation of the lungs.'
'I'll tell you what he died of,' burst out La Fayette, who had listened to the news with evident distress. 'He died of grief at the way those at Versailles have abandoned the army. He knew this winter was going to prove disastrous and it wore him out. Monsieur de Sartines is three parts to blame for his death, for I know that he encouraged his junior officers from a distance to conspire against him. What do those gilded imbeciles in their ministries know about war – and those who command in it?'
'Who will take his place as commander of the fleet?' Gilles asked, equally saddened, as though by the death of a friend. 'Will we have to wait for another appointment from Versailles?'
'That would be the last straw! The command should go by rights to the Neptune's captain, the Chevalier Destouches, who is a fine man.'
'And it is he who has succeeded to the command at present,' Tim replied. 'But I must say, the funeral very nearly caused a riot. The anabaptists of Newport are not used to the ceremonies of your Romish Church and General Rochambeau managed it very well. They haven't got over it yet.'
For Tim, the news he brought was first and foremost an opportunity to see his friend again and Gilles was glad of his presence at the modest Christmas festivities that Washington made a point of laying on for his officers and men. The enforced inaction of camp life was having its effect on his character. He was becoming more reserved, more taciturn and losing some of his earlier spontaneity. When not roving the camp like a sick wolf, he could be found at one of the outposts, standing for hours on end upon some eminence, his service cloak pulled up to his eyes, staring out at the hummocky whiteness of the forest and the snow-covered hills as though he could see into the distance to the exact spot where stood the woman he had believed in and who had betrayed him. Over and over again, he asked himself what Sita could have hoped to gain from it all. Why, if she had really wanted the Iroquois, had she encouraged him to desert to go with her? Unless it was to make a gift of him to Cornplanter's executioners, as the man who had prevented her from coming to him before? It was an appalling and discouraging thought, but he could see no other explanation.
But although, by slow degrees and almost without his realizing it, contempt was extinguishing love in him, it could do nothing to combat the imperious demands of his senses. Continence began to be a torture to him, for which he sought such relief as he could. Not that it was difficult. His steel blue eyes, the sardonic curl to his lips and his air of careless arrogance attracted women as larks to a mirror. His charm and the skill he had developed in all the arts of love held them to him afterwards.
But he formed no new attachments. His desire satisfied, he went on his way to the next conquest, careless of the tears and lamentations that followed his going.
In this way, he passed from the wealthiest woman farmer in New Windsor, a red-haired Juno of ample proportions who would have married him, to the minister's niece, a fragile, secretive girl who would beat her breast between embraces and wail that she would go to hell for it, but was none the less able to turn on all the a
rts of a courtesan to bring him back when he showed signs of tiring of her. There was the wife of an innkeeper and a Molly Pitcher, passive and purring, in whose great, vacant eyes he sought in vain for some resemblance to the delightful Betty who had crept into his tent that night at Peekskill. In any case, Sitapanoki's memory was still too keen and poisoned all these fleeting fancies with its too ready comparisons.
Only once did he meet with a rebuff. It was one evening when he had gone in search of wood to revive the dying fire in his tent and returned in time to see a woman enveloped in a long cloak come quickly out and walk off in the direction of the village. Dropping his faggots, he ran after her and caught her up.
'When the master of a house is not at home,' he cried, his arms tightening round the thick woollen stuff that seemed more solid than the slender form within, 'it is not polite to enter and then leave again without waiting.'
'Let me go, Lieutenant,' Gunilla's cool voice answered him. 'What cause would I have to remain in your tent since you were absent?'
Gilles let go his hold, drew back and bowed courteously.
'Forgive me, Gunilla. I had not recognized you in that cloak. But please, don't go away now.'
'I have no time. Mrs Gibson is waiting for me and she will be anxious if I stay longer. I only came to bring you a pot of jam.'
'Jam? That was good of you. But do come in, if only for a moment – so that I can at least tell you honestly how good it is!'
She followed him in silence, just as she had once done in the mountains of Pennsylvania. Inside the tent a lantern was burning and it was almost cosy. The pot of jam was standing next to the lantern and Gilles picked it up and opened it, inhaling the fruity smell of it yet at the same time never taking his eyes off the girl. It was some while since he had seen her for, ever since her arrival at headquarters, Gunilla had been living very much under the wing of Mrs Gibson who had loved her at once for her courage and gentleness and treated her like the daughter she had never had. In her house, Gunilla led a life, that was tranquil to the point of austerity but she adapted to it happily. She scarcely ever left the house and garden, with the farther end of which Gilles was so well acquainted.
Falcon 1 - The Lure of the Falcon Page 36