watching for Bonaparte these past twenty years it became too hot to assemble on the coast. Now that things have quietened, we’ll see a return to the old ways no doubt.’
Hervey nodded. ‘So, do we speak of Englishmen or French who will come ashore?’
‘Frenchmen, for the most part. There are plenty of the old
Hervey was not especially troubled by this, but the relative numbers were not good. If the French were to put fifty men ashore they would outnumber him more than two to one, taking account of the horseholders. Ordinarily that wouldn’t trouble him either, but in this darkness, with this rain, and with mutual support so difficult…
‘Is this a rich cargo? Do you expect the landing to be in any strength?’
The officer looked grave again. ‘Indeed I do. That is why I asked for a whole troop of regulars.’
Hervey raised his eyebrows.
‘Is something amiss?’
‘I have fewer than thirty men.’
For an instant the riding officer’s bile was roused, but his selfcontrol had been too many years in the making. ‘I confide that the deficiency will be no fault of yours, Captain Hervey, but this makes things damned tricky. I’d intended that we should take the vessel and everyone about the business. But this weather was already making that a forlorn hope, and with insufficient men we stand little chance of taking the landing party. All we can safely do is seize the contraband and the porters, and the light-men, for they’ll have information of use to us.’
‘It will have to be with the sabre, too, for we couldn’t trust to pistols and carbines in this rain.’
The riding officer agreed. ‘Let us talk of the details, then.’
Hervey found the riding officer to be a practical man. That he wanted keenly to close with the contrabanders was beyond doubt, but he was not so reckless as to expose Hervey’s dragoons to unnecessary danger, for, as he explained, they would succeed at the very least in putting the porters to flight without their uncustomed cargo. The design they worked out was therefore to send a party to the beach a halfmile or so from where the landing was expected, to work along under the cliffs until they were in a position to mount an attack which would separate the porters from the contraband. A second party would, meanwhile, work along the clifftops until they came across the light-men — the light on the other side of the cove would have to be left, for they hadn’t enough men to mount two simultaneous approaches.
Hervey was able to tell each and every one of his dragoons what was the design, crowding them into the mill in their two parties, cheered by the fervour of the sweats who were only too happy to have another go at Johnny Crapaud, and by the eagerness of the greenheads to claim their first laurels with the old enemy. He was at pains to disabuse them of any notion that it would be an easy affair, however. And the revenue riding officer, likewise, warned that these were men who would fight hard for their money, as well as for their lives.
At one o’clock — more than three hours later than the riding officer had hoped — Hervey’s dragoons began their final approach march. The rain had eased considerably, the wind had dropped, so that speech no longer had to be in a raised voice, and it seemed just a fraction less dark than before. The going was easier anyway with a guide, and they quickly found the path to the beach. Hervey, with Serjeant Armstrong, led twelve of his most experienced men down its precipitous length, slipping and sliding and cursing, but with nothing worse at the bottom than a dragoon with a twisted ankle. He had put the other party, of eight, in the charge of one of the revenue men, for he dared not risk fewer than seven horseholders, and even that would be a trial for so indefinite a period. The two parties had no way of signalling to each other, so which of them was to begin its work first would have to be left to circumstance. Ideally, the light-men should be apprehended first, before they could extinguish their beacon, or else any commotion on the beach would have them flee. If only the revenue could see exactly where the beacons were — but so cunningly shielded to landward were they that only by coming right up on them could they be fixed.
Down on the beach it was distinctly lighter. The chalk cliffs and the sea seemed to be reflecting the faint moonlight piercing the breaking cloud, and Hervey could now make out his men at three paces — though it was still not enough to exercise any degree of control if it came to a fight. The wind was little more than a breeze now, and the rain had been stopped for a full ten minutes. Now was the time to unwrap the firelocks and load. It took only a minute with these dragoons, yet even that was one minute more than it took Armstrong to slip a bulleted cartridge into Hervey’s percussion-lock. Hervey himself carried his repeater. He carefully unwrapped the primed cylinder and fitted it to the carbine, surprised how quickly the real test of its handiness had come.
In single file, with Armstrong at Hervey’s side, and the riding officer at the other, they advanced at a brisk pace to close the halfmile. Hervey counted the paces, shorter slightly than he would have managed on firm ground, but three for every two yards nevertheless by his reckoning. After his fifth hundred they saw lights ahead, one well to the left — evidently on the contrabanders’ ship — the others almost directly to their front, dimmer and moving. How far ahead, it was not possible to tell.
‘They’ve begun to bring the stuff ashore,’ said the riding officer. ‘Their pickets will be posted, therefore. We’d better be ready.’
It struck Hervey at once: if the lights were visible from here, they must already be at the picket. ‘I think we should—’
Two blinding flashes and two reports made louder by the cliffs’ echo came an instant later. The riding officer fell back clutching his stomach.
‘Wick, Tansey,’ shouted Hervey. ‘See to Mr Poole. Remainder, extended line, at the double, advance!’
A shingle beach, at the double — this was a trial even for a rifleman. ‘Number from the left,
After two hundred yards they were struggling to keep in line, from the cliff bottom to the water’s edge, and beginning to blow as hard as their horses after a good canter. But they knew that if they didn’t get to the lights quickly they’d face more determined resistance.
Another hundred yards. Hervey could see Armstrong was with him on the left, and another dragoon close in on his right. There were more flashes and ear-splitting reports, pointblank. He levelled his carbine as he ran, and fired — once, twice, three times, all by instinct, for there was no target to see. Armstrong fired too, as did the dragoon on his other side.
Hervey could now make out figures by the lantern light at the water’s edge. A welter of fire came his way from front, flanks, above and behind — then screams, shouts, curses, oaths.
Hervey fired four rounds in rapid succession in an arc to his front, threw down the carbine and drew his sword. ‘From the left, number!’ he bellowed.
‘One, two… five, six… nine, ten,’ came the numbers. Then ‘Armstrong, sir!’
Four men down, but Armstrong still there — thank God. Another fusillade brought fresh screams from his left. ‘Lie down! Reload!’ Hervey shouted. But he knew that with momentum gone, and the cover of darkness, he would never get his men forward now, even were Armstrong to drive them. All he could do was hold his position and harry the French with fire as they withdrew, for they surely couldn’t continue the work with the threat of dragoons so close.
He was wrong. Just as the riding officer had said, these men would fight. In a few minutes more, fire opened again in their direction, and there was movement too. ‘Keep up a steady return, Serjeant Armstrong. Let’s try to fool them we’re more than we are.’
‘From the left, count to five, fire!’ shouted Armstrong.
Hervey ran from man to man to reassure him with the hand. The furthest dragoon to the left was bleeding badly from his leg — Finch, the oldest sweat — but he was still reloading as if at musketry practice. Hervey called him by his nickname as he bound up the wound with a silk square. ‘Choky, don’t let those waves get to your powder. We can’t abandon this place now.’
The appeal was direct, and Finch knew it must be desperate. ‘I know, sir. But don’t leave me to them French if you ’as to pull back. I can limp, with an ’and.’
‘I promise,’ said Hervey gripping his shoulder. ‘But it’s as bad a scrape as ever I saw.’
The volleying to their front increased, and Hervey knew they must soon be overrun, for the French would have gauged their numbers from the puny return of fire.
‘Captain ’Ervey! Captain ’Ervey!’
Hervey swung round and saw Johnson and the horseholders — eight more carbines and sabres! ‘Rally here!
