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cious supplies began to go up in flames. With a roar, stored ammunition exploded.
“Steady!” Kleber reminded. “Keep ranks!”
“When they come at us, crouch and fire on command!” Junot added.
We saw a small lake by the village of Fula. Our excitement grew.
There was an Ottoman regiment in front of it, looking irresolute.
Now the officers galloped up and down the columns, giving orders to ready a charge.
“Strike!” With a cheer, the bloodied French swept the rest of the way down the hill and toward the Samaritan infantry that garrisoned the village. There were shots, a plunge of bayonets and clubbed muskets, and then the enemy was running. Meanwhile Turks were fleeing from whatever had appeared in the west as well. Miraculously, in minutes an army of twenty-five thousand was collapsing into panic, fleeing east before a few thousand Frenchmen. Bonaparte’s cavalry galloped past us, giving chase toward the valley of the Jordan. Ottomans were hunted and slain all the way to the river.
We plunged into the Fula pond, slaking our thirst, and then stood wet and dripping like drunken men, our cartridge pouches empty.
Napoleon galloped up, beaming like the savior he was, his breeches gray from dust.
“I suspected you’d get yourself into trouble, Kleber!” he shouted. “I set out yesterday after reading the reports!” He smiled. “They ran at the crack of a cannon!”
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With his instinct for the political, Bonaparte immediately named our near-disaster the Battle of Mount Tabor—a much more imposing and pronounceable peak than modestly sloping Djebel-el-Dahy, though several miles distant —and proclaimed it “one of the most lopsided victories in military history. I want the full details dispatched to Paris as soon as we can.”
I was certain he hadn’t been as prompt in relaying news of the massacre at Jaffa.
“A few more divisions and we could march to Damascus,” Kleber said, intoxicated by his improbable victory. Instead of being jealous, he now seemed dazzled by his commander’s timely rescue. Bonaparte could work miracles.
“A few more divisions, General, and we could march to Bagh-dad and Constantinople,” Napoleon amended. “Damn Nelson! If he hadn’t destroyed my fleet, I would be master of Asia!” Kleber nodded. “And if Alexander hadn’t died in Babylon, or Caesar been stabbed, or Roland been too far behind . . .” 1 8 4
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“For want of a nail the battle was lost,” I piped up.
“What?”
“Just something my mentor Ben Franklin used to say. It’s the little things that trip us up. He believed in attention to detail.”
“Franklin was a wise man,” Napoleon said. “Scrupulous attention to detail is essential to a soldier. And your mentor was a true savant.
He’d be anxious to solve ancient mysteries, not for his own sake but for science. Which is why you’ll now go on to meet Silano, correct, Monsieur Gage?”
“You seem to have brushed the opposition out of the way, General,” I said amiably. Bonaparte sundered armies the way Moses parted the sea. “Yet we’re still at the lip of Asia, thousands of miles from India and your ally there, Tippoo Sahib. You’ve not even taken Acre. How, with so few men, can you emulate Alexander?” Bonaparte frowned. He did not like doubt. “The Macedonians were not much more numerous. And Alexander had his own siege, at Tyre.” He looked pensive. “But our world is bigger than theirs, and events progress in France. I have many calls on my attention, and your discoveries may be more important in Paris than here.”
“France?” Kleber asked. “You think of home when we’re still fighting in this dung hole?”
“I try to think of everything, always, which is why I thought to bring relief to your expedition before you needed it, Kleber,” Bonaparte said crisply. He clapped the shoulder of the general that loomed over him, great hair like a lion’s mane. “Just be assured there’s a purpose to what we’re doing. Stand your duty and we’ll rise together!” Kleber looked at him suspiciously. “Our duty is here, not France.
Isn’t it?”
“And this American’s duty is to finish, finally, what we brought him here for—to solve the mystery of the pyramids and the ancients with Count Alessandro Silano! Ride hard, Gage, because time weighs on all of us.”
“I’m more anxious to get home than anyone,” I said.
“Then find your book.” He turned and stalked off with his staff t h e
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of officers, finger jabbing as he fired off orders. I, meanwhile, was chilled. It was the first I’d heard him mention any book. Clearly, the French knew more than I hoped.
And Astiza had told them more than I wished.
So we were in it now, tools of Silano and his discredited Egyptian Rite of Freemasons. The Templars had found something and been burned at the stake by tormentors hoping to get it. I hoped my own fate would be kinder. I hoped I wasn’t leading my comrades to destruction.
We dined on captured Turkish meats and pastries, trying to ignore the stench already rising from the dark
