bivouac.
He asked the esaul why, and was met with a smile: ‘My Cossacks would not enter the home of simple people without invitation.’
It was impossible to tell if it were the truth, or even a part of the truth. The esaul smiled enigmatically, and at almost everything. But every time he smiled, Hervey liked him the more.
They were not off-saddled long before a fire was sending up a cloud of thick white smoke, fed by a Cossack sprinkling gunpowder on the flames.
‘To whom do they signal, sir?’ asked Agar.
Hervey had unshipped his carbine, nodding for Johnson to take the saddle from him. He looked across to the plume of smoke again. ‘At what distance did the scouts ride today, Mr Agar?’
‘I … I did not see that any scouts were posted, sir.’
‘Nor did I. But we rode as if there were, which means that either the esaul is foolhardy, or the scouts left Siseboli before light. I’d lay my money on the latter.’
‘So they are now signalled in?’
‘They’ll be ranging too far to hear the trumpet, and besides, so I observe, the sotnia has no trumpeters.’
Fairbrother now joined the inquisition. ‘But why signal your presence to the Turk, if he’s about?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Hervey, genuinely puzzled. ‘There’ll be method in it, no doubt. Go and ask the sotnik, Mr Agar.’
‘Sir.’
He returned after ten minutes (during which time Johnson and the two dragoons had laid out the bedding rolls and got the pots simmering) with the answer that indeed the esaul wanted the Turks to know they were hereabout. Hervey could only shake his head, puzzled; it was contrary to all the practice of reconnaissance by light cavalry.
Fairbrother had an idea. ‘Perhaps he would fire them thence like foxes?’
Hervey looked at him, puzzled.
‘Lear: “He that parts us shall bring a brand from heaven and fire us hence like foxes”. The esaul intends bolting the Turk with smoke and fire.’
Hervey looked thoughtful. ‘I had not thought the meaning to be thus. I had always thought it a reference to burning the Philistine corn.’
Now Fairbrother looked puzzled. ‘I have a dim recollection, but I confess it eludes me.’
Hervey smiled. ‘Then at last my memory surpasses yours. It was the foxes that did the burning out. Samson caught three hundred of them and tied them in pairs, then set their brushes alight and loosed them into the Philistine corn.’
‘Of course; now I remember. Deuced clever of him. I wonder if the esaul knows the story.’
‘I suppose there are foxes in Roumelia …’ replied Hervey, pensively. Then he smiled again, fondly, at the remembrance of a Horningsham sermon many years past. ‘I recall my father one day, in his pulpit when the lesson had been read, and it had been that chapter of Judges, and Lord Bath and a good many farmers were in the congregation, and he said something along the lines of “Now here you might lament the ill keepering, and the docility of the hunts in Philistia at that time, that there should be three hundred foxes at liberty …”.’
‘I am all eagerness to hear your father in his pulpit, as I told you in England,’ said Fairbrother agreeably.
‘And what say you on the subject, Mr Agar?’
Agar cleared his throat apologetically. ‘I believe, sir, that Shakespeare had read Orlando Furioso, for there is a notable passage therein concerning the fox bolted by smoke and fire into the terrier’s mouth. I think it more probable that Lear alludes to foxes being bolted by fire than to their spreading of it.’
Fairbrother’s face was a picture of mild triumph.
Hervey nodded, conceding. ‘I’m run to earth.’
When the scouts came in – three of them, towards last light – Hervey took Agar with him to find out what they had learned. But Agar found the sotnik now more difficult to understand, the subject less conducive to gestures of the hand. Eventually he was able to establish with some confidence that the Turks were marching in the general direction of Siseboli, though at no great pace, and had begun to make camp for the night at Sagora, three leagues to the west – an eccentric route perhaps, but evidently the Seraskier wished to give Bourgas a wide berth, for he could not know for certain that the Russians had not landed there as well as at Siseboli. The sotnik said that the scouts were to return to their posts, to be ready to resume contact with the Turks at first light. And as for their own camp, there would be an in-lying picket, but no greater precaution.
‘A gamble,’ said Hervey, as he walked back with Agar. ‘But probably a safe bet.’
They slept under the stars – slept well. There was no stand-to at first light, except that Hervey’s party turned out and watched, carbines in hand, as the sun rose over where the horses were tethered, along a low wall at the south-east corner of the vineyard.
The esaul’s disregard for field discipline made him uneasy once again. He did not doubt that the chance of one Turk, let alone a sufficient force, traversing the country undetected during the night and assaulting the camp at dawn was practically nothing, but it remained a possibility, and to ignore it therefore reckless. But, then, Cossacks – irregulars in all but name – were not circumscribed by standing orders; they lived by gambling.
No Turk attacked the camp, and the esaul, had he seen them, would have smiled at Hervey and his men. So the morning routine was that of the camp at Siseboli – a leisurely breakfast, no muster. When an hour had passed, without ceremony or words of command the esaul simply climbed into the saddle and put his mare into a jog-trot, and the rest of the sotnia vaulted astride behind him and formed twos in apparently random fashion. Even Fairbrother, no advocate of drill, shrugged his shoulders and smiled as Hervey looked at him quizzically. And yet, they conceded, it seemed to work – and, again, with no little economy of effort.
Hervey and the others mounted and took post as before, this time on the near, landward flank (for that towards the sea was broken by numerous dry channels), but they were not long marching before a single rider came over the rise at a canter. He made straight for the esaul, reined about and made his report while circling. The esaul heard him without remark, nodded, and turned to the khorunzhiy (cornet) at his side. A few words followed, and then the khorunzhiy and his coverman were into a hand gallop back whence they had come before Hervey could make up his mind whether to sit and wait or close to learn what he might.
The sotnik rode over to them.
‘The Turks broke camp at first light and their cavalry now lead.’ Agar was able to translate quickly and with confidence.
‘Cavalry leading: you’re sure that’s what he said?’ pressed Hervey.
‘Yes, sir.’
He was intrigued. He knew that Turk practice was for the cavalry to march at the rear and to the flanks so as not to disturb the ground for the infantry. Placing them in advance meant the Seraskier expected opposition or wanted to quicken the pace. Perhaps the fox had indeed been fired from his hole. In either case it was ripe news; little wonder the khorunzhiy had been sent speeding back to General Wachten.
‘The esaul believes they might be before the walls of Siseboli by evening. We shall therefore close with the Turk at once. The bat-horses are to go back to the vineyard.’
‘Very well. They can go with the Cossack servants.’
Hervey did not doubt the esaul’s appreciation of the situation. It was possible that if the cavalry hastened and the infantry made a forced march, their fires tonight would be seen from the walls of Siseboli; but after so many weeks’ delay, what should now compel the Seraskier to hurry?
‘What is the esaul’s intention on closing with the Turk?’
