'Of the great lady who is so beautiful that you seek her memory, even among the fishermen's sisters in Virginia?' Gilles asked boldly.
A shiver ran through Fersen. His eyes, which always had a tendency to gaze into some invisible distances, returned gravely to his interlocutor.
'Do not say memory – say rather her image, my friend. For to me she is only a dream – an unattainable dream. But better still, do not speak of her at all.' Then he laughed suddenly and went on: 'Now tell me something. I thought you had your commission?'
'I have. I am a lieutenant in the Marquis de La Fayette's legion. I know I don't look like it, but I left my fine black uniform coat somewhere in a thicket near Richmond. I had to fall back on my Indian's tailoring. You may not know it, but we Americans are practically penniless.'
'I see. Well, I shall see to it that you do not remain so! France will have much to offer you. I am told, by the by, that your men have given you a nickname – some bird, I think?'
'That's it. They call me the Gyrfalcon,' Gilles said with a laugh, 'and you can't think how proud I am of it. It's the best name I've ever had.'
Fersen studied the younger man for a moment, his tall, slim figure moulded by the crude deerskin, the firm, tanned features, hawk nose and hard eyes, which the moonlight turned to steel.
'You are right,' he said thoughtfully. 'It suits you better than any. The gyrfalcon makes his home in my country and I have cause to know that you can strike as fast as he. He is a great hunter. Only, I do not care much for your present plumage, Sir Gyrfalcon. It's more suited to an owl than to a king of the skies. Good night.'
With that, the Swede wrapped himself in his cloak and set off resolutely down the rutted track somewhat pretentiously styled the Hampton road, his elegant, highly polished boots protesting at every step.
'Oh well,' Gilles murmured, grinning, 'his dreams are likely to be painful ones. He'll have some blisters on his feet before he gets there. Come on, Pongo. Let's go.'
When Gilles woke the next morning to the sound of reveille, he saw the Indian entering his tent, solemnly bearing a large parcel done up in strong grey canvas. There was a note pinned to it.
'Soldier bring this for you,' Pongo said, laying his burden down upon Gilles' lap.
The letter was from Fersen:
'Just in case you should have forgotten it, my friend, I will remind you that your name still figures on the roll of the Royal Deux-Ponts Regiment and that our Colonel-in-Chief, the Comte de Deux-Ponts, has not yet released you. He commands me to tell you that it will be inscribed there in future with the rank of lieutenant which General Washington conferred upon you. You will also make it plain to General Washington, as also to the Marquis de La Fayette, that you are merely on loan from us.
'You will find enclosed the wherewithal to appear fittingly in the battle or in the hour of victory. The sword is my own, a family heirloom, and I know that you will make good use of it. It and the rest come to you in token of the friendship of Axel de Fersen. P.S. The assault will be for today.'
The parcel contained the uniform, brand new, of an officer in the Royal Deux-Ponts. It was all there, the blue coat with the yellow facings, the brass gorget with the arms of the regiment upon it, the gold epaulettes and the tricorn hat with the yellow plume. With it was a magnificent gold-hilted sword. Engraved upon the blued steel blade with which Gilles was already making delighted passes through the air, was the one word Semper.
Gilles' first impulse was to put on all this brilliant plumage at once. He was already shaking out the shirt of fine lawn, when he chanced to look up and see one of his men, Sergeant Parker, pass by the opening of his tent. Parker's dress was a haphazard combination of a pair of striped trousers, much patched and too short for him, faded stockings wrinkling round his ankles, one shoe gaping like an oyster and a waistcoat, green with age, that lacked both buttons and facings but was possessed of a grand assortment of rents and holes.
Carefully, Gilles put the smart uniform back into its grey canvas wrappings. Then he dressed himself in his old, battered deerskins. If the assault was to be for today, he would not lead his men into the English fire clad in a way that should set him apart from them. Compared with the magnificent blue and white of the French regiments and the brilliant red coats of the English, which sometimes made the besieged town look like an outsized strawberry, the American troops had a shoddy appearance, but if the sun of glory would only shine for them, then it would turn their poverty to splendour.
'These poor garments have been through so much,' he murmured to himself, 'they have earned the right to go on to honour – or to death. Fersen would understand.'
The sword, however, he took with him gratefully, for this was no dress sword but a real soldier's weapon, a strong and formidable blade, much better than his own which had a damaged guard. He hung it proudly from his old, plain, leather sword belt, then knelt and said a rapid prayer, commending his soul to God if death should come to him that day. That done, he went out to get his orders from the General, feeling happy and at peace with himself for the first time for many months. Perhaps it was because the supreme moment had come when nothing mattered any more, except the fact that they were going into battle.
Outside, it seemed to him as though a curtain had been lifted on the last act of a great tragedy and he was looking for the first time on the landscape which had grown more ruined with every day that passed.
Before him, across a vast plain crawling with troops and scored with trenches, with the grey splashes of marshland scattered over it as traps for the unwary, he saw the smoking heap of rubble that was Yorktown. No citizens remained there now, only the stubborn swarms of red ants, moving to the shrill, unending music of the pipes of the Scots 71st Foot. And beyond it, on the river, the black hulks of the still blazing frigates Loyalist and Guadeloupe and the half-submerged Charon alongside them. The artillery of the Comte de Choisy and General Knox had done its work well and had not finished yet, for the guns on both sides were still pounding. The town was fighting back furiously, despite the shells ceaselessly eating into its walls. The two redoubts held firm. But as Rochambeau slowly tightened his patient grip, so the mines went up one by one, taking men with them, so that the shrieks of the wounded and dying mingled with the continuous roar of the guns. The sun shone, the sea was blue and the gaily coloured flags streamed in the morning breeze, and yet the scene was like an inferno, but an inferno from which no man sought to escape. Gilles himself was burning to plunge into it.
The officers of La Fayette's staff were assembled in his tent. There were Hamilton, Barber, Laurens, Poor and Gimat. But the General himself was absent. No one was speaking. They sat, each in his own corner, wrapped in his own silent thoughts and nursing his own impatience. The word had gone round that the assault would be that day, but no one dared believe it. Hamilton, who had received the rough edge of Washington's tongue yet again when he went to inquire, was biting his nails and brooding near the doorway. When Gilles came in, he literally fell on him.
'Well? Have you heard anything? Is it today or tomorrow—?'
'If I can believe a note I had from one of Rochambeau's aides, it is today.'
Hamilton's face lit up and he flung his arms round him.
'God send you may be right! It's enough to drive one mad, sitting here watching men shot down and doing nothing. If this goes on, Yorktown will fall to the sappers and the gunners, without our striking a single blow.'
At that moment, La Fayette sprang from his horse outside the tent and swept inside. His eyes were sparkling and his wig askew and he was evidently in the grip of some strong excitement, but whether of joy or anger none of them could have said. It seemed to Lieutenant Goëlo that it was something of both.
'Gentlemen,' La Fayette cried, casting his hat into a corner, 'today we are to have the honour of attacking one of the two redoubts. We shall be on the right while the French attack on the left.'
'We?' Hamilton said. 'Who do you mean by we? Our whole force
?'
'No, sir. When I say we, I mean ourselves – La Fayette's division. And the same with the French. Their assault will be led by Baron Viomenil with a regiment or two—' He stopped, his face suddenly suffused a dull brick red, and the unpleasantly high-pitched voice which grated so painfully on the ears rose to a shout: 'And if I have my way, we shall have taken that redoubt before that nincompoop Viomenil has even reached the parapet! Do you know – do you know what he dared to say just now, when Washington and Rochambeau gave out the orders for the day?'
He glared round at them, his whole body trembling from head to foot.
'He dared to cast doubts on the gallantry of my men! He dared to suggest that we could not fight well enough to take the redoubt from the English! So, gentlemen, you may tell your men. I'll have the hide off any man who even looks like hesitating. I am determined to make an end before them, do you hear? Determined! Go, now, and make your preparations. We attack before nightfall. We will be told the exact time in due course.'
The officers filed out in silence. Gilles was about to follow when the young General held him back.
'One moment, if you please,' he said curtly. 'It seems I have to congratulate you, lieutenant. General Rochambeau's aides can talk of nothing but your exploits. You saved Count Fersen's life, I believe?'
'It is not worth talking of, General.'
There had been a truculence in La Fayette's tone which Gilles did not understand and did not like.
'You think not? On the contrary, I feel sure that you accomplished an excellent piece of work. The best, perhaps, that you have ever done in your life, for now your future is assured. The Queen will be able to refuse you nothing.'
'The Qu—'
'Do not look at me with that bewildered expression. Yes, the Queen. Count Fersen is a great friend of hers – and our ravishing sovereign lady does not like people to harm her friends. So, I congratulate you. That young sprig is very dear to her.'
So that was the Swede's secret! Just two short words, a mere eight letters in all: the Queen! He was in love with the Queen and, suddenly, Gilles found himself wanting to see what Margaret Collins looked like, that for her sake the Swede had nearly ended in a shark's belly.
Yet whether or not Fersen was in love with the wife of his king, it still did not explain La Fayette's vicious tone, the contemptuous curl to his lip or the bitterness in his eyes. What was the nature of his own feelings for Marie-Antoinette? Gilles wondered. He was well aware of his opinions regarding kings in general, but he considered his impassioned tirades rather as the expression of idealistic views engendered by their present adventures. Brought up on the encyclopedists and a practising freemason, La Fayette could scarcely be expected to sound like a staunch monarchist. But the Queen was a woman…
'My lord Marquis,' Gilles said, stressing the title deliberately, 'Her Majesty is not acquainted with me and most probably never will be. Yet permit me to say I am amazed to hear her spoken of disrespectfully, in a foreign land, by a gentleman of France.'
For a moment, he thought the General would burst. The blood rushed to his face.
'Respect, you talk of? You poor provincial fool! Go to court once, only once, and look about you at the Queen's circle, and then come and tell me how many of the fine gentlemen who surround her are thinking of her as their queen, and how many are simply dreaming of getting her into their beds.'
Eyes like blue ice swept over La Fayette, now frothing with anger, then, from his greater height, the Gyrfalcon spoke scornfully.
'I have heard enough. I may be a provincial, though I'll take leave to tell you that my province is as good as yours, but by your words you give me cause to think that you yourself have made one of the gentlemen you speak of, and that you are merely jealous of Count Fersen. For, if I understand you, you seem to blame me for saving a fellow-officer's life.'
He withdrew in time to avoid the inkwell which came flying after him, though its contents left a few more stains on the much-abused deerskin, and emerged into the sunshine with a sense of actual physical relief. The scene had upset him because he was conscious of a growing attachment to his chief, whom he admired for his courage, and he did not want to have to change his opinion.
'What's going on?' Tim demanded, coming to meet him. 'I heard the shouting from the bottom of the hill. What have you done to him?'
Gilles smiled at him enigmatically. He took off his battered hat and studied the red plume nonchalantly.
"Nothing at all. We disagreed upon a point of etiquette. You know, I think that General La Fayette has become too good an American to remain a proper Frenchman… I had thought better of him.'
And carelessly, as though by accident, he opened his fingers and let the wind take the red feather and carry it lightly away down the hill.
The assault began just before five o'clock that evening. Covered by a continuous bombardment from the guns of Knox and Choisy, the two waves advanced on the redoubts. The French troops moved forward as though on parade, in impressive order, led by Baron Viomenil and the Comte de Deux-Ponts. There were two regiments only, the Royal Deux-Ponts and the Saintonge, two solid walls of white and red and blue and yellow, marching straight into the English fire with pipes and drums playing, and not a man out of step to spoil the magnificent array.
On the American side, things were somewhat different. 'Forward!' La Fayette yelled. 'Charge!' He dashed straight ahead, waving his sword, followed by Hamilton, de Gimat and the rest. The men charged like lions, in a furious rush to scale the parapets. For the first time, Gilles felt the elation of a pitched battle. While Tim flailed away, alternately using his bayonet and the butt of his gun as a club, he raced up the slope with Pongo hard on his heels wielding his tomahawk like a master, regardless of the bullets whistling around him. Once upon the parapet, Gilles plunged with a yell of triumph into what seemed like a seething mass of pointed hats, the Hessians of von Bose's regiment. The lust of battle that was in his blood had taken possession of him wholly now, surging up out of the deeps of time, carrying him beyond reason and sweeping away the basic instinct of self-preservation. He drove forward irresistibly, cutting his way through the mass of bodies which gave way before him, caught sight of the standard, shot through with bullet holes but still erect upon a heap of rubble, and in a wild dash reached and grabbed it.
His cry of triumph was answered by a rousing cheer and it was only then he saw that the fighting had ceased suddenly. The redoubt had fallen. All its defenders were either dead or taken prisoner. It was all over – so soon!
With a sense of disappointment at the brevity of the thing, he leaped down from his pile of rubble, the flag still in his hand, and found himself face to face with La Fayette. The General was smiling, although the smile did not reach his eyes.
'Good work, lieutenant. I am sorry, though, that in the heat of battle you appear to have lost the plume from your hat.'
'I did not lose it, General. I took it off.'
'I see.' He paused and then resumed: 'Well, lieutenant, since you are evidently burning to distinguish yourself, and in view of your keen interest in the French army, I have a task for you.'
'Yes, sir?'
La Fayette turned and crossed over to the parapet, whence it was possible to see the other redoubt. It was still keeping up a sustained fire and consequently the French troops were making little headway.
'As you see, they are not yet inside.'
'It looks to be more strongly defended.'
'Possibly. Nevertheless, you will carry my compliments to Baron Viomenil and say that should he happen to require any assistance we shall be most happy to render it.' Gilles bowed, coolly smiling.
'I shall do it with pleasure, General. Not so much for the enjoyment of giving the Baron a facer as because I could do with some more action.'
With that, he leapt over the parapet and plunged eagerly back into the fighting, the Indian still on his heels. But, hard as he tried, he was still too late. The second redoubt had just fallen in its turn.
Both outposts of the besieged town were now gone and its fall was only a matter of time. For the first time for many days, the guns were silent and the long lines of wounded were making their way towards the overloaded wagons.
Gilles found Baron Viomenil, surrounded by his staff, and delivered La Fayette's insolent message with a straight face, without altering a syllable. Among the officers present, he saw Fersen, black with powder and supporting one arm which had suffered a cut from a bayonet. The Swede flashed him a grin.
'Still in your old feathers? What have you done with my gift?'
'Kept it for the sun of victory to shine on. I couldn't wear it today. My men would not have understood. They too, you see, look more like night owls than like soldiers.'
'It's not often you find an officer with so much consideration for his men, but I cannot but agree with you.'
Fersen's smile changed to a grimace as he altered his grip on his wounded arm.
'You cannot stay like that,' Gilles said. 'Let me get you to a surgeon.'
'By no means. My servants can take care of me. There's no ball to be extracted and the surgeons are overworked already. I'll do better with my own people. Besides, La Fayette would never forgive you if you left the field without his permission. We'll meet again soon.'
Once back with his own men, Gilles stood looking out over the marshy plain with a jaundiced eye. The noise of the guns had given way to the groans of the injured, shamelessly revealing the other hideous face of war. Now that the excitement of the battle was gone, all that remained was pain and wretchedness. Men mown down by the musket fire from the forts lay everywhere, their eyes staring and hands clutching at places where the congealing blood stuck the rags of tattered uniforms to gaping wounds. Others, on whom death had not yet laid his hand, were striving to drag themselves along, their own weight too much for their failing strength, and crying like lost children or pouring out a string of blasphemous oaths. Now they had to contend with swarms of flies and with the mosquitoes that haunted the marshy ground. The smell of blood mingled with the odours of the mire and here and there a figure could be seen moving helplessly among the wounded, engaged in God alone knew what tragic and futile task of selection.
Falcon 1 - The Lure of the Falcon Page 39