"The Sabre_s Edge" - читать интересную книгу автора (Mallinson Allan)

CHAPTER FOUR

Two days later Hervey picked up a pencil. Pen and ink was no good. The paper was damp and the ink spread, so that even his carefully formed letters became indistinct in a matter of seconds. Damp paper, damp powder, damp biscuit – mouldy, even – on which they now subsisted, damp leather inside which men's feet chafed, the sores then suppurating: it was as inauspicious a beginning to a campaign as ever he had known. Indeed, it was more than inauspicious: it was ignominy in the making. Four hundred miles still to their object – Ava – and here they struggled through the delta's mud to attack stockades with only bayonets and the breasts of brave men. Hervey was ashamed, and not a little angry. Rangoon, 17 May 1824 My dear Somervile, I am very afraid that your strictures regarding the assumptions on which this war is prosecuted appear already to have been most sadly prescient. We made a landing here but one week ago against opposition unworthy of mention, but the populace has not risen in our support. Indeed, the native people are nowhere to be seen, and with them, we may suppose, are all the provisions and transport upon which the supply of the army was to be found. There are some cattle hereabout, but the order that they be unmolested remains, and therefore our soldiers starve that the sacred cows might live. The rains have come – in such torrents as I could scarce describe – and the river is now swollen in the manner required, but Peto's flotilla is unable to make progress until the supply is ordered and the gun forts all about – of which nothing was known hitherto – are reduced.

Two days ago I attended the Grenadier Company of the 38th, which is Campbell's own regiment, in two most gallant attacks upon stockades upstream of here. Their Captain was killed, and the ensign too, and they lost one in three of the Company, but they were all for assaulting a third and stronger fort until I ordered them to await reinforcement by the battalion companies, which, in the event, did not show because of some alarm here. The fighting spirit of the men is admirable, but I have a fear that it will be frittered away in ill conceived assaults – the Company had not even ladders for the escalade – and, perhaps the more so, by sickness, which is already rife.

Major Seagrass is dead of a fever, and I am thereby now General Campbell's military secretary. There is little for me to do, however, and yesterday when I gave my opinion of the parlous state into which we were lapsing (my cause was in respect of the mounting sick lists), Campbell became so angered that I am still unaware if it were on account of his despair at our situation or with my candour, though in this connection I must say that I do not believe he has a true grasp of our peril. I see none of the energy for which he had reputation in Spain, nor any faithful imagination of the scale of the undertaking. I pray most fervently that I am wrong in this assessment, but… There was the sound of spurs outside and then a knock. The door opened and into Hervey's quarters stepped one of General Campbell's ADCs, well-scrubbed, hat under arm and sword hitched high on his belt. 'Sir, the general would speak with you; at once, if you please, sir.'

'Very well,' said Hervey, rising. 'Do you know in what connection?' 'I am afraid I do not, sir. The general has spent much of the morning in conference with his brigadiers.'

Hervey placed the letter to Somervile in the pocket of his writing case, gathered up his sword and shako, and left his quarters certain that he was to hear another paragraph of sorry testimony for inclusion in the letter.

The general's door was open. Hervey knocked and stood to attention. 'Come in, Captain Hervey; come in.'

General Campbell looked tired. Or was it worry? Hervey had received no word from him after handing the quartermaster-general a report on the Thirty-eighth's endeavours. He was unsure even if he had read it, for there had been nothing but routine orders from Campbell's office in days. Neither had there been any sort of conference; Peto had fumed about it when they had dined together the evening before. 'Good morning, General,' said Hervey, a shade warily. 'Sit down, sit down.'

It was curious, thought Hervey, how the general repeated his bidding. He did it not infrequently, of late especially. Was it a mere affliction of the nerves, like blinking or twitching, or did it reveal an uncertainty? Since the general could not doubt that any order would be obeyed, it could only be that he tried to overcome his reluctance to give the order by repeating it for his own hearing. Yet in such small matters as entering a room and taking a chair, what could there be by way of difficulty? Except, perhaps, that the general intended saying something disagreeable.

Surely not? Surely a major-general would not rebuke a captain direct when there were others to whom he might so easily delegate the unpleasant task. Hervey took off his shako and sat in a rush-seat chair in front of the general's writing table.

'I did not say that I approved of your conduct the other day – on the river, I mean.'

Hervey was perplexed. The fact was indisputable, but the words suggested one thing and the manner of their delivery another. Was this a statement of disapproval or not? The general did indeed seem weary. 'No, sir.'

'I did approve, most decidedly. We can have no frittering-away of our troops, especially not our best ones. We shall need every man.'

Hervey nodded. He would once have said 'Thank you' to a sign of approval, but now he saw no occasion for thanks.

'I have intelligence that Kemmendine shall be the base from which the Burmans will launch their attacks on us. It is in all likelihood in a strong state of fortification already.'

Hervey nodded again, wondering what these remarks portended.

'Your observations on the Burman manner of fighting would appear most apt. It would seem they are advancing on us by degrees through the jungle, digging and throwing up their damned stockades with each day.'

Hervey frowned. 'That is exactly the manner in which I understand them to fight, General. But I must say that it is not by my observation as much as by study of what others have written before.'

The general waved a hand dismissively. 'Yes, yes, but it was you who wrote the memorandum. That is what I meant. And now you've been inside one of these damned bamboo forts of theirs, you'll have other notions of how to deal with them, no doubt.'

Hervey was about to say that he considered any attack without artillery to be iniquitous, when the general pronounced his intention to deal with the encroaching threat. 'I shall attack at once -tomorrow. I shall take them utterly by surprise.'

Hervey, certainly, was surprised. Indeed, he was as intrigued by the notion as he was by the general's purpose in summoning him.

'You think ill of my design, then, Captain Hervey?'

Hervey would once have been flattered by such an enquiry. Now he felt only anger for the reply he would have to make, for it hardly seemed a design at all – more a statement of hope. 'I should not advise it, sir.'

The general looked taken aback; whether by the sentiment or by its plain expression, Hervey could not tell. Nor, indeed, was he in the slightest degree concerned. The general frowned. 'How so?'

Again, Hervey would once have measured his words; now he paused but a moment. 'The jungle is the Burman's habitude. General. It is where they would choose to fight us. To fight them there we should have an approach through very trappy growth, and could scarce keep formation. Or, if we were in column, it would be the very devil to deploy, especially if there were skirmishers concealed. And in all this it would seem to me utterly impossible to achieve the slightest degree of surprise.'

General Campbell looked astonished. 'That is not the opinion of my brigadiers.'

'They must answer for themselves, General,' replied Hervey confidently. 'With respect, sir, you asked me for my opinion.'

The general made no reply for the moment. He might at other times have been angry, but now he was thoroughly baffled. He might be new-come to India, but he had fought here long ago, and in Mysore, and it was 'the India rule' that a prompt attack confounded the enemy. Was that not, indeed, the duke's own tactic at Assaye? It had certainly been their method at Seringapatam. 'Then what would be your course?'

Hervey imagined the answer was obvious. He managed nevertheless to hide his dismay. 'Let them expend their effort in coming to us. Fight them in the open, or at the forest's edge, not when they're behind their walls. We might borrow some of the navy's artillery, too.'

'I don't care for the notion of waiting,' replied Campbell, shaking his head very decidedly.

'I am not suggesting we sit idly, sir. There is much to be done by way of outposts and patrols, and harassing. The thing is this: the Burmans must come to us if they are to seek any decision. They have no alternative. In which case we can make their work devilish unpleasant.'

The general sighed, loud and rather peevishly, then lapsed into silence.

After what seemed an age, Hervey judged his attendance no longer required. He replaced his shako, saluted and left for his quarters without a word.

He was not long there when the same ADC announced that General Campbell would see him again. Hervey put down the pencil once more and returned to the headquarter office, unsure this time whether he would hear testimony for inclusion in his letter of denunciation, or another outburst of anger (Campbell was hardly likely to reproach him for not seeking formal permission to dismiss?).

In truth, he did not much care what was the reason. Indeed, there was almost an air of truculence about Captain Hervey as he opened the general's door.

'You make a lot of sense, Hervey,' said Campbell, briskly. 'A lot of sense. I have decided to attack the Burmans when they reach the forest edge. But I shall not sit idly until then. We must have very active outpost work – patrols and the like – day and night. Put the Burmans on edge, deny 'em sleep. And I've decided to lead an attack myself on one of these stockades. Tomorrow. Can't abide sitting here another minute!'

Hervey was cheered; also gratified by the general's confidences, if uncertain as to their cause. 'Shall you want me to accompany you, sir?'

Campbell looked rather surprised. 'If you would like to, yes. But don't trouble yourself if there are other duties to be about.'

Hervey took his leave, formally this time. He returned to his quarters and resumed his letter-writing mystified in no small degree by the affair.

At long length he finished the deposition, with its postscript on the general's new intentions, and signed it wearily. He laid down his pencil, then he picked it up again, adding after his signature, 'We must, however, allow that the general is a gallant man.' In the afternoon, there being no duties to detain him, Hervey went aboard Liffey to dine.

Peto's mood had changed; he was no longer merely exasperated. Flowerdew had to give him wide berth as he circled with the decanter, the commodore's gesticulations becoming more and more extravagant. 'Half my ships ply to Calcutta like packets, now, and the rest all but careened here. And the crews sicken: Marryat hasn't an officer or warrant officer fit for duty, and he's had ten men die already. I'm sending Larne to sea for better air. In a month I'll have no ships in fighting trim at this rate.' He waved the decanter away, and then waved it back again. 'Dammee, this is no longer just a business of the Company's sovereignty. The honour of the Service is at stake!'

Hervey sipped at his glass of hock, chilled very tolerably by its immersion for several days in the river. He could understand his friend's dismay, for this was His Majesty's navy's first trial since- cBut the two are in consonance, surely? Ava is the object, is it not?'

Peto subsided but frowned severely. 'Only up to a point, Hervey. The Company will have safeguarded its position by defeating the Burmans' design. All they have to do is stop his offensives in Arakan and force a treaty. You know full well it was the commander-in-chief's opinion that we should have stood solely on the defensive. Whereas the Royal Navy shot its way into Rangoon and cannot.now move but out the way it came!'

'Ay, but unless Bagyidaw is deposed there'll be no end of alarms,' countered Hervey, shaking his head and reflecting the commodore's frown. 'Someone shall have to go to Ava. Of that there's no doubt.'

Peto beckoned his steward to serve their dinner. 'And what if he should delay so long as to be then unable to clear the Irawadi? It would be my ships that are seen to turn.'

Hervey blanched. 'Are you suggesting we abandon it? How will that serve the honour of the navy?'

'I am suggesting no such thing. I am suggesting that the commander-in-chief will break off the campaign here when the attacks on the borders of the Company's territory have been repulsed. And we shall have to steal away from this place without a shot – like thieves in the night.'

Hervey looked doubtful. 'That is if the Governor-General is of the same mind as the commander-in-chief.'

Peto huffed. 'Amherst has the mind of a nincompoop, as we have ample evidence.' 'What would be your design?'

'To reduce the garrison here to what is required only to repulse an attack. What would that be? A brigade? No more, surely? And then to take off the remainder at once to force the Irawadi. Rangoon will draw in the Burmans from far and wide, and that we should take advantage of. But there's no profit in sitting here the while with so many, and all my ships tied up supporting them. And for that matter, every day our numbers dwindling.'

'I grant you we might force the Irawadi. But without the strength to garrison it, the lines of communication would be at the Burmans' mercy. This general, Maha Bundula – he would see it at once.'

Peto looked put out. T thought you might have allowed that I would see the same!' Hervey frowned. 'I don't comprehend, Peto.'

'All these transports and escorts now plying back and forth across the Bay of Bengal: all they're doing is feeding the garrison here. Cut the garrison by two-thirds and there'd be no need of external supply. I could land half my own stores. It would see them through any siege. And the ships released thereby could keep open the Irawadi.'

Hervey pondered the notion as Flowerdew laid a plate of fish on the table. 'Have you shared this opinion with the general?'

'I have sent him a memorandum, just before you came.'

Hervey wondered how it would be received. The fall of Ava was not essential to the general's reputation. All that was necessary was for him to hold Rangoon. It was not his fault that the Burmans hadn't flocked to his support. If the commander-in-chief wished him to take Ava against such opposition, then he would have to supply him with the means to do so. And yet, the taking of Ava in such very trying circumstances -against the odds – would surely be his making? 'He intends awaiting a general attack for a week or so. He will certainly want the support of your guns. And tomorrow he is going to lead an assault on one of the stockades.' 'And do you go with him?'

'Yes. He intends that I should write the despatch.'

'I've a mind to come with you, but I've called my captains aboard.'

Hervey smiled. 'There'll be more opportunities, I assure you. The general is determined to have the garrison as active as possible while he waits.' Peto helped his guest to a fair portion of fish. 'Bekti. The best you'll ever taste. Caught this morning and brought upriver by Diana. What a boon she is.'

Hervey had seen steam on water before, first in a boat no bigger than Liffey's cutter on the Blackwater river in Ireland, and then the barge that had towed their transports steadily upstream on the St Lawrence, six winters ago. But nothing like Diana. Diana was a gunship, her ports painted Nelson-style, and her smokestack half as high as Liffey's mainmast. 'The baby figure of things to come, do you think?'

'Of some things, perhaps. But Diana could never stand off in a fight. A twelve-pounder would smash her paddles to pieces. I can't risk her in the van too long if the river narrows and the forts get her range.'

Hervey tried his fish. 'I don't know whether it's because I've not had a spoonful of anything half-decent in a week, but this I agree is uncommonly good.'

Peto looked pleased. He drained his glass and let Flowerdew refill it. Then he leaned back in his chair. 'Let us speak of agreeable things for a time. I never told you my news, did I? It is signed and sealed and I had a note of it only yesterday.'

Hervey indulged his friend by laying down his fork and sitting back to receive the evidently happy intelligence. 'I have bought an estate near my father's living.' cAn estate, indeed,' said Hervey, as impressed as he was surprised.

'Nothing on any grand scale. And the house shall need attention. But it has a good park, and is but a short drive from the sea.'

Hervey wondered why a man who so much disdained being ashore should take such a course. cDo you plan going on half pay?'

'It will come to it, Hervey; it will come to it. I have a tidy sum invested in Berry's cellars, and another in two-per-cents, but I have a notion of something a shade more… substantial.'

Hervey smiled. 'Then you are not contemplating matrimony?'

Peto raised his glass and took a very urbane sip. 'A man in his right mind who contemplates matrimony will never embark upon it, Hervey. In any case, a house has no need of a mistress – only a keeper.' Hervey said nothing.

Peto realized the import. 'Oh, my dear fellow: I am so dreadfully sorry. I-'

Hervey smiled and shook his head. 'Think nothing of it. I'll take another glass of your hock, and drink to your arrangements in Norfolk.' Peto cursed himself for being the fool. Corporal Wainwright came to Hervey's quarters before first light with a canteen of tea, and returned shortly afterwards with hot water. Their exchanges were few. 'It's raining, sir.'

Hervey wondered at the need of this news, supposing that the hammering on the roof was the same that had been for the last fortnight.

'And the guard says it's been raining all night, sir.'

This much was perhaps of some moment, since the going would clearly be of the heaviest, perhaps even preventing the general from taking the field piece. Hervey sighed to himself at the thought of another affair of the bayonet. The wretched infantry – no better served now by the Board of Ordnance than if they had been with Marlborough a century past. For ten years – more – he, Hervey, had had a carbine that would fire in the worst of weather, yet the Ordnance showed not the least sign of interest. The notion of a percussion cap when a piece of flint would do seemed to the board an affront to economy. And little wonder if its members were as fat-headed as Campbell.

Hervey sighed again as he drank the sweet tea in satisfying gulps. Perseverance – that was the soldier's virtue. It was both duty and consolation. 'Corporal Wainwright, I give you leave to remain here and keep things dry.'

'And I decline it, sir, if you please. Thanking you for the consideration, that is, sir.'

Hervey smiled. 'It was not entirely for your welfare, Corporal Wainwright. I had a thought to my own comfort on return!' 'I'll engage one of the sepoys, sir.'

Hervey smiled again as he rose to his toilet. 'It's not what I said it would be, Corporal Wainwright, is it? Hardly the dashing campaign, with gold to fill the pockets.'

Corporal Wainwright pulled the thatch from Hervey's boots and began to rub up the blacking while Hervey began lathering his shaving brush. 'I don't hold with stealing, sir, and it seems to me, from what I've heard, that that's all it amounts to half the time. Prize money's a different thing. But plundering a place is no better than thieving.'

'Your sensibility does you credit, Corporal Wainwright. The duke himself would applaud it.' Hervey spoke his words carefully, but only because he had regard to the razor's edge. 'Pistols sir? I'm taking mine.'

'I suppose so. It is conceivable the rain will cease.'

'What I should like to know, sir, is how rain stays up in the sky before it begins to fall.'

Hervey held the razor still. 'You know, I have never given it a thought. Nor, indeed, do I recall anyone else doing so. I suppose there is an answer.' He resumed his shaving.

'I'll bind the oilskin extra-tight, sir. Wherever this rain's coming from, there doesn't look to be any shortage.'

In a few minutes more, Hervey was finished. He dressed quickly, thinking the while of the rain question. 'The rain is in the clouds. That much is obvious.'

Yet that was only a very partial answer (consistent with his knowledge of natural history). The rain outside descended as a solid sheet of water -the noise on the roof was, if anything, louder than when he woke – yet how did it rise to the height of the clouds in the first place, and then stay aloft?

'Steam. Steam rises' he said, pulling on his boots. 'That Diana works that way, I think.'

Corporal Wainwright said nothing, content instead to listen to the emerging theory.

'A great deal of this rain must have begun as steam.'

But then why should it now fall as rain? And where did all the steam come from in the first instance?

'For the rest I must ask Commodore Peto. The weather is his business. For us it is just weather, I fear.' He fastened closed his tunic. It had become a poor affair with a daily soaking this past month. Wainwright took away the bowl of water.

Hervey looked out, observed the downpour and put off his visit to the latrines until after breakfast.

He sat down at his desk-cum-table still turning over the rain question in his mind. Peto would surely know a great deal more – all there was to know, probably. But what opportunity he would have to pose his query in the coming weeks, he couldn't tell. The commodore had declared he would be taking Liffey and two of the brigs out to blow good sea air through her decks and give the hands practice with canvas again.

Wainwright was soon back with Hervey's breakfast – excellent coffee (he had been careful to lay in a store of that before leaving Calcutta) and a very indifferent gruel. Hervey thanked his luck for the supper of bekti the night before, and for the lump of salt pork that Peto had pressed on him to bring ashore. It would be their ration today, for the salt beef had now gone, and it was biscuit only again.

In half an hour the bugle summoned him -'general parade'. He put on his shako, fastened his swordbelt and drew on his gloves. He looked at the pistols, wondering. He picked up both and pushed them into his belt: if the rain did stop, he'd feel undressed without them. He wished he'd brought his carbine, but it had seemed the last thing he would need when he joined the general's staff in Calcutta. The sortie paraded outside the north gate. They were six companies, three British and three native, together with two field pieces – a six-pounder and a howitzer – some five hundred men in all, and another fifty dhoolie-bearers. They gave an impression of unity by their red coats, except for the artillerymen, who wore blue, but close to they were rather more disparate than a Calcutta inspecting officer would have been used to. It was but a fortnight since the landing, and already some of the troops had a ragged appearance which spoke of their exertions and the flimsiness of their uniforms, as well as the lack of supply. For the most part, the trousers were white, summer pattern, but heavily patched, and the sepoy companies had abandoned their boots. Some of the officers wore forage caps. The general, indeed, wore one. Hervey would have been appalled had he not witnessed all that had gone before: an officer of the Sixth never wore a forage cap but in the lines. That it should have come to this in one month beggared belief.

There was no doubting the effect as a whole, however. In close order, and from a distance, these men looked like a solid red wall. They would stand, come what may. And their muskets – they would know how to handle them, for sure. Five rounds in the minute at their best – how could the Burmans match or bear it? The trouble was, the best volleying was only possible with dry powder.

General Campbell was rapt in conversation with the sortie's lieutenant-colonel, a short, stocky man whose voice was said to be the loudest in the expedition. Hervey studied the general carefully. He had not fully appreciated his height before, for he seemed now to stand taller than any man on parade. Without doubt, Sir Archibald Campbell had the crack and physique to convince a subordinate of his competence; Hervey pushed all his doubting thoughts to the back of his mind.

Would Campbell address the sortie? The rain hammered so loud it would be pointless but for a few men in the front rank. So they would just turn into column of route and march off down the track into the forest. Poor infantry – trudge, trudge, trudge, a mouthful of black powder biting the cartridge, a minute of rushing blood in a bayonet charge, and then…

Then it was the same for all of them – kill or be killed. The soldier's life was nearest Nature -lowly, nasty, brutish, and all too frequently short.

It was, of course, why they made comrades of one another so quickly. Everyone knew that. Hervey had seen it in his first week at the depot squadron, and he supposed it was why, perhaps, decent society could sometimes hail the soldier, for all his licentiousness. The quality certainly liked an officer in his regimentals. He wondered if they ever imagined them as they appeared this morning, however – sodden, tattered, grubby. Or what they looked like when rent with grape, ball, or the point of iron and steel.

It was strange he should think now of Henrietta. Now, when things stood at their most brutish. But Henrietta had had a good imagination of the truth, for all her feigning otherwise. Not so Lady Katherine Greville. Hervey did not suppose she had ever thought of it, let alone was capable of imagining it. Regimentals were not for this. They were for the delighting of her and those like her – a mark of potency rather than aught else. He did not suppose it, indeed; he knew it. Her letters told him as explicitly as she had implied the day they had ridden together in Hyde Park. That was four, nearly five years ago, and still she wrote. He wrote too, not exactly by return, but with sufficient despatch to keep the correspondence lively. It flattered him. She might have her pick of officers in London – and no doubt did – and yet she penned him letters. He smiled to himself, now, at her questions. Did he wish to be an ADC? Did he wish for an appointment at the Horse Guards? If he would not return soon to London, did he wish a place on the commander-in-chief's staff, or even the Governor-General's? There was not much, it seemed, that Lieutenant-General Sir Peregrine Greville could not arrange if his wife were to ask him. 'Sir?' Hervey turned.

'I asked if you still don't want your cape, sir,' said Corporal Wainwright, water running down his shako oilskin as if it were an ornamental fountain. 'I can fetch it quick enough.'

Hervey shook his head. 'No. I think we're beyond all help in rain like this. It'll be sodden in minutes and then a dead weight. Why don't you take yours though?'

'No, sir. It'll be just as sodden. And I'd as soon kick off these boots.' He smiled.

Hervey smiled back. Corporal Wainwright had been wearing shoes when first he had seen him on Warminster Common, though the rest of the inhabitants of that sink had been barefoot. 'Easier going in the approach, I grant you, but just wait till you get a bamboo splinter!'

Words of command now rippled through the ranks, like dominoes toppling. Back up to attention came the companies; they shouldered arms, moved to the right in column of route, then struck off to the dull thud of soggy-skinned drums and watery fifes – a cheery enough display for the general, thought Hervey, even if the sepoys did look distinctly ill-used to marching in torrents of rain. The King's men, he didn't doubt, would have marched in many times worse, and some of them in the Peninsula, where the rain could fall as a stinging hail of ice rather than as a warm drench. Poor, wretched infantry – the regiments of foot – and their feet often as not cold and wet. The cavalryman knew privation, and worked the harder for having a horse to look after as well as himself, but his feet bore nothing like the punishment of the infantryman's.

'Nice tune, sir,' chirped Corporal Wainwright as he picked up the step. 'Yes,' said Hervey, in a vague way. 'Don't you recognize it, sir?'

'No?' Corporal Wainwright obviously thought it of significance. 'The rain it fell for forty days!'

'Of course,' he said, smiling – black humour, the soldier's privilege. 'But I'm afraid the drum-major is excessively an optimist. The rains will be an affair of months, I fear.' ??? They were not set off more than half an hour, and only a short distance into the jungle, when the first shots were fired. In this rain they defied belief. Hervey could not conceive how any powder might be dry enough, especially in Burman hands.

There was at once a great cheer and the leading men went at the pickets with the bayonet. It was over in a minute. Hervey saw nothing.

The column halted and the general pushed his way to the front, Hervey with him. They found a half-finished stockade built directly across the track and extending the length of a cricket pitch each side into the forest, empty of all but redcoats, and half a dozen Burman musketeers too slow on their feet. General Campbell peered at the bodies, as if they might reveal something of the campaign before him. 'Pull the place down!' he snapped. 'Press on, Colonel Keen!'

They left a sepoy company to the work, and the column trudged on into jungle made increasingly dark by the heavy skies. In another half-hour they passed three more stockades just as hastily abandoned, and then not a sign of the enemy in five miles of swamp and thicket until the artillerymen were too exhausted to pull their guns any further.

'In God's name get the sepoys to the ropes!' cursed the general.

Hervey despaired. He had taken gallopers into the jungle – two-pounders dismantled, and carried by packhorses. But guns like these… it would not serve. 'Sir, I believe the effort may not be worth it. And when it comes to withdrawing, we could never afford to abandon them.' 'I agree, General,' said Colonel Keen.

Campbell looked vexed. He wanted to blow in a stockade and tell the Burmans there was nowhere safe for them. But he had brought the wrong guns and he knew it. The Madras artillery's commander had told him so last night. 'Very well. The sepoy company will remain guarding them until we return.'

There were no packhorses, of course. Not one. Indeed, there was not a single animal in the entire expeditionary force. But this was to be an entirely novel campaign, one that did not observe the normal usages of war. Hervey seethed. Who were these officers who would undertake a campaign without a few ready horses? The next two miles were done much quicker without the guns. They did not find the enemy, however, nor any sign of him, and in an hour the column emerged from the forest into green padi fields six inches deep in water.

Colonel Keen halted the column to allow the general to come forward.

'What do you make of it, Colonel?' asked Campbell, sounding confident still.

The colonel had the advantage of two minutes' survey through his telescope, but even so there was not much he could tell him. 'I feel the want of a map very sorely, General. I suppose yonder village is fortified, or at least has some hasty stockading erected, for they must have known of our approach these several hours.'

General Campbell now surveyed the ground for himself.

The village lay half a mile ahead astride the track by which they had come. Without a map it was impossible to tell if it ran through the village and beyond, in which case the village commanded further advance, or whether it ended there. Colonel Keen thought the question apposite since, he reasoned, the Burmans would be bound to defend the former whereas they would probably have abandoned the latter.

The general nodded to the logic, but either way he would have the place. 'And if I find so much as a loophole in yonder buildings I'll raze the entire village.' Colonel Keen folded his telescope. 'Column of companies, I think, General?' 'If you please.'

The colonel turned to his adjutant. 'Column of companies if you please, Mr Broderick.'

While this evolution was taking place, which required the sortie to advance a good hundred yards to make manoeuvre room, and for the companies to extend left and right for about fifty into the padi, Hervey climbed to the lower branch of a sal tree and began his own survey. To the right of the village, perhaps a little closer than to the forest's edge, was water – one of the delta's many creeks, he supposed. To the left, and beyond, the same distance, was jungle. He strained to make out something of the village, but the cloud and the rain made it impossible to tell whether there was any stockading. There was certainly no sign of life. He looked at his watch: a little past midday. They could not advance much further without spending the night in the forest. And there were the guns to think of.

The companies struck off at a good pace, splashing through the muddy rice as if skylarking on a beach. Hervey climbed down and pushed his way along the track to where the general marched with the Thirty-eighth's lieutenant-colonel, just to the rear of the leading company. He fell in behind the adjutant, counting himself lucky to have his feet out of the padi. It was only then that he observed how effective was a general's cocked hat in a downpour. Campbell had his pulled over his ears, and water ran down the points 'fore and aft' clear of both face and neck. Strange, the things one noticed at times such as these, he mused. 'View halloo!'

Hervey woke instantly. Where? What? He couldn't see beyond the shakos of the company in front.

'Skirmishers out!' he heard the lieutenant-colonel order. Men from the light company began doubling past on both flanks to form a skirmishing line. How would they load in this weather? 'Smart work!' said the general.

Hervey could now see the Burmans forming up on either side of the village – with officers on horseback. He prayed there would be no cavalry, however inexpert. They would have the advantage, for sure, even in this going.

'Curse this padi!' It was taking forever to make headway. Hervey glanced left and right: the lines were uneven, and they were having to mark time in the middle, the men on the flanks up to their knees in water, mud sucking at every stride. He thought it bordered on the reckless. If there were cavalry behind the village they could be onto flanks in an instant. He began unbinding one of his pistols, but he had little expectation of its serviceability. He cursed again. A pistol which misfired, perforce at short range, was worse than useless. He began rebinding. He would trust to the sabre, as the infantry would trust to the bayonet. At a hundred paces musketry broke out from in front of the village, left and right. Hervey could scarce believe it. Just as at Kemmendine the Burmans had concealed their stockades in byaik little more than shoulder high, and kept their powder dry. But again they'd fired too soon and not a ball struck home.

The skirmishers held their fire: theirs was to discourage any who would stand in the open.

Coolly, as if at a field day, the general took in the business before him. 'One company, if you please, Colonel,' he said, matter-of-fact. 'Remainder to stand fast in reserve lest those there begin to advance.' He pointed at the Burmans drawn up either side of the village.

It was promptly done. Eight dozen bayonets in two ranks inclined right and quickened almost to double time, Campbell following. Hervey was hard-pressed to keep pace.

The musketry increased, but it was ragged and had no more effect than before.

The ground now fell away – three feet, perhaps more. Down the slope to the bamboo walls ran the company – eight-foot walls, not five.

There were shots from the left – hopelessly too far again – as Hervey and the general raced to catch them up. He couldn't understand how the Burman fire discipline could be so poor when their other skills were so admirable.

The general glanced left, marked the smoke, then drew his sword and sprinted the last dozen yards to the fort.

The Thirty-eighth were already atop the walls. Hervey glimpsed the bayonets at work – bloody, vengeful work.

The general climbed on a corporal's shoulders and heaved himself up. Hervey and the ADCs followed as best they could. Hervey lost his footing on the wet bamboo several times until Corporal Wainwright leaned out and got hold of his crossbelt.

But it was over by the time they were up. Five minutes' work, at most, to turn the fort into a slaughterhouse as bad as he'd seen. There were dozens of dead piled against the gates, and as many more scattered about the stockade in ones and twos where they had stood and fought or cowered and craved mercy, both in vain.

General Campbell, sword still drawn, but unbloody, at once ordered out the company to assault the second stockade. Hervey, standing on the parapet, glanced back at the other three companies formed up ready, their colonel in front, and wondered at the general's impetuosity. Was it that he was happy at last, knowing exactly what he was about – the simple certainty of fighting, and with his old corps? He might almost be seeking a glorious death. He made work for his covermen, for sure.

Two ranks! Get fell in!' The serjeant-major blew his whistle fiercely and waved his sword. 'That was nothing! Look sharp, damn you!'

The voice of the Black Country made Hervey think of Ezra Barrow: dragoon to captain – what would he make of it? He would not have volunteered for it, that was certain. 'Never volunteer for anything' was a maxim Barrow had long lived by. And it had evidently served him well. Hervey might almost envy him at this moment, undoubtedly taking his pleasure in an afternoon's repose.

At last the company was fell in to the serjeant-major's satisfaction. They were scarcely depleted, for all the ferocity of the first assault, though every man was as gory as a surgeon's mate. No matter, the rain would wash them clean. But by their look, Hervey wondered if it was what they would want.

The general now threw over all restraint and placed himself in front of the line. He waved his sword at the objective, two hundred yards ahead. 'Once more, the Thirty-eighth! Let 'em have Brummagem!' There was a great cheer.

Poor Colonel Keen, sighed Hervey. The general was a captain again and nothing would stop him.

He took post on the right of the front rank, along with the ADCs, with Corporal Wainwright beside him. It would be the closest he had come to a bayonet charge – just as he'd wanted. He could already feel the strength of a line of well-drilled men elbow to elbow, 'the touch of cloth', even blue with red. If only the enemy were not behind a palisade! But no, he needn't worry: the bamboo walls would delay them, not stop them, surely? These men's blood was hotted: they would take the place by escalade again, and the Burmans would once more rue their lot. But the second stockade was not as easy as the first. The walls were no higher, and the defenders no greater, but the Burmans held their fire and then stuck at it just that bit longer. The first volley came at about seventy yards – some lucky hits, enough to shock – then another at fifty which felled several men including a serjeant. 'Charge!'

The general's voice was louder than the rain and the firing combined, and the cheering louder still as the right-flank company of His Majesty's 38th Foot, under their erstwhile colonel, ran slipping and sliding to the wooden walls.

This time the defenders would not be bolted. They held their ground and kept up a steady fire even as the first redcoats were scrambling up the palisade.

The second rank began desperately unwrapping their flintlocks to engage them. Few managed to fire.

The Burmans had the advantage and the will this time, and the fallen red coats began to show.

But little by little – it seemed an age yet could not have been more than minutes – red began to preponderate atop the palisade. It defied reason, for they could not be gaining it by fire. Hervey himself had fired both his pistols, and the rounds were wide. No, it was not fire that let the redcoats escalade the fort.

He got a shoulder again from a thickset private- 'Yow mun gow, sir; me leg's shot through.' This time he reached the parapet while there was still fighting. 'Where's the general?'

'I can't see 'im, sir,' said Wainwright, looking either side of the wall.

'Christ!' It wasn't his business to guard him, but- An ear-splitting roar and the whizz of shrapnel smoke rolled across the stockade floor and hid all for an instant.

Hervey leapt from the parapet and dashed for the gun. A dozen redcoats beat him by a mile. A dozen more lay full of iron.

He saw his man though, spear couched, hesitant but standing his ground. Up went the sabre as he ran in, Wainwright with him.

He didn't feel the ball strike. He only saw the lights dancing in the sky as he fell. And then the shadow of Corporal Wainwright over him, saying something he couldn't hear.