tomorrow, the day is our own!’ He shook his head just perceptibly. ‘But as there seems to be nobody to fire back at just now, I do wish they would stop it.’
‘You have sent someone, Sir Arthur?’ asked General Hill.
‘No, they are Whittingham’s men. He’ll see them right, I have no doubt. Only look at the ugly hole those fellows have left in my line!’
It was as plain to them as may be, long shadows or not: there was a gap in the allied line a furlong and more. Hervey reckoned the French must have the sun in their eyes not to see it.
Brigadier-General Alexander Campbell, in the Government sett of his old regiment, the 74th Highlanders, and sitting astride a tit of a mare that even the commissary would not have looked twice at, could bear it no longer. ‘General, I think I had better take the Seventh there. If those fellows keep running they’ll take the rest with them.’
‘No,’ said Wellesley, shaking his head. ‘I shall want the Seventh here soon enough. But I wish you would go to their second line and try to get them to fill it up.’
Campbell raised his hat and turned his charger. ‘Hill, I’d be glad of another galloper, if you would. I’ve had to send mine with word to the next division.’
General Hill nodded to Hervey. ‘By all means, Campbell. I shall return to mine. I perceive you will have the fight of it here tomorrow, if not tonight. I wish you well.’
Hervey was disappointed. He had hoped to learn more of affairs here; it was not every day a cornet might listen on the conversation of the commander-in-chief. He saluted and took off after the brigadier and his major obediently.
‘Great heavens!’ cursed Campbell, his nostrils flaring, his eyes wide. In five minutes he had discovered what Sir Arthur Wellesley could not observe. ‘A whole brigade’s worth of them running! The supports have gone as well!’
Hervey was equally astonished. The scrub, to the rear of the olive groves which marked the front line, was alive with men making west at the double. Many of them had thrown off their hats and downed their muskets. They looked like stags running before hounds.
Brigadier-General Alexander Campbell was having none of it, despite Wellesley’s caution. He drew his sword and took off at once into the middle of the rout, laying about any man within reach with the flat of it. Hervey and the brigade-major, likewise swords drawn, stuck as close as they could, fearing at any moment a Spaniard would turn on his abuser and shoot him from the saddle.
The brigade-major all but grabbed at Campbell’s reins. ‘General, it’s no good! We must get help!’
‘Damn it, Gorrie, I’ll flay ’em back to their posts! I’ll damn well shoot them to their duty!’ Campbell let his sword drop by its sling and drew his pistols instead.
Hervey and the brigade-major dutifully drew theirs, Hervey certain it would be his last. There were a thousand Spaniards in musket range, and not all of them had thrown down their arms.
Campbell fired into the air. A few men checked; others further away, seeing a madman not an adversary, changed direction. He drew a bead on the closest Spaniard still running, and fired. The man fell stone dead.
There was a split second only to marvel at the marksmanship before a ball whistled past Hervey’s head, then several more. It was pointless trying to find the culprits – there were dozens of muskets levelled at them.
‘General, we must run for it!’ the brigade-major insisted.
There was a sudden and decided fusillade behind them. Hervey turned to see a long line of cavalry approaching, enveloped in smoke.
‘Thank God!’ sighed the brigade-major. ‘See, General, the Spaniards have brought up their cavalry.’
Brigadier-General Campbell, feverishly reloading his pistols, seemed not to have heard.
‘General!’
At last he turned, his face as red as his coat. ‘And not before time,’ he rasped. ‘I’d hang every other man if he were mine!’
Hervey shifted uneasily in the saddle. While he could admire the general’s courage and determination, the sanguinary rage was more than a little alarming.
Campbell slapped his mare hard with the flat of his sword – if not quite as hard as the unfortunate Spaniards – and took off as suddenly, almost leaving Hervey with his thoughts. ‘Thank you, Cornet! You may go back to Hill now,’ he called over his shoulder, as if he were dismissing a pilot at the end of a day’s hunting.
Hervey touched the peak of his Tarleton punctiliously, glanced about gingerly, then inclined left so as to make straight and fast for the Cerro de Medellin.
By the time he found General Hill’s headquarters – a two-mile ride – it was dark but for the campfires.
‘Stand easy, Mr Hervey,’ said the assistant quartermaster-general. ‘The French guns blaze away every so often, but things are quiet. Keep your horse saddled, though.’
‘Yes, sir. General Hill might wish to hear that the Spanish are getting back into their place on the right flank.’
‘Very well, I shall inform him.’
Hervey turned and went to look for Private Sykes. In a division of infantry he knew it ought not to be too difficult to find a man with a horse, but the night was now so black that it was difficult to make out anything more than half a dozen paces away.
‘Sir?’
‘Is that you, Sykes?’
‘Yes, sir. I heard Loyalist blowing. There’s coffee over here, sir. Picket’s got a brew on all night.’
‘That would be welcome indeed, Sykes.’ He glanced over his shoulder to fix exactly the general’s campfire in case he were summoned.
‘I wondered where you was, sir, when the gen’ral came back.’
Hervey smiled, ruefully. ‘I think in the despatches it might say “liaison with our allies”.’
‘Sir?’
As Sykes took Loyalist, there was a sudden musketry due east – three hundred yards, perhaps four. Hervey grabbed the reins again and began running back to General Hill’s headquarters.
The general was already giving orders to Colonel Stewart, his second brigadier. ‘Yours to the support of Low’s brigade, then—’
The firing ceased as abruptly as it had started. General Hill waited for several minutes before changing his mind.
‘Very well, Stewart: as you were. A false alarm. These Germans fire too readily. You may go back to your brigade, but keep a sharp watch.’
The brigadier took his leave.
‘Mr Hervey?’ said the general, peering at him in the light of a good blaze.
‘Sir!’
‘Thank you for your report. Have you taken coffee since coming back?’
‘No, sir, I was—’
The firing began again, but from atop the crest this time, the flashes quite clear.
General Hill growled. ‘The old Buffs, as usual making some blunder! I do wish these fellows would contain themselves better. Fetch my horse, please.’
An orderly brought him his black gelding and helped him into the saddle.
‘I’d better go and put them right. They’ll have lost all direction, I fancy.’
Hervey clambered astride Loyalist while General Hill and one of the brigade-majors took off as if it were daylight. He had the devil of a job keeping with them, Loyalist napping again, wanting his head in the pitch blackness.
Four hundred yards at a fast go, and uphill, and the general shouting, ‘Cease firing there, you men! You face the wrong way! Cease firing!’ Hervey could only wonder at the impulsiveness of infantry generals: they made the cavalry’s work that day seem timid by comparison.
The firing suddenly faltered. Loyalist started as black shapes loomed.
One grabbed the general’s reins. ‘
Hervey drew his sword, spurred at him and cut hard on the offside. There was a cry and the black shape fell.
