On His Majesty's Service

this. He fancied he would enjoy it.

They fell in between the Grenadiers and the Kozlov Regiment.

‘A fine prospect, then. Don’t you agree, Corporal Acton?’

‘Can’t understand why I didn’t take the Fusilier serjeant’s shilling and not Serjeant Deakin’s, sir.’

Droll; Hervey smiled. And since there was little else to do in the advance but march in step, he might as well pass the time of day: ‘You were ’listed by Serjeant Deakin, were you? C Troop man – the image of a dragoon. No question that you preferred his shilling. How much was the bounty?’

‘Nine guineas, sir.’

‘I hope there were not too many off-reckonings.’

‘I was able to buy a small interest in a public house, sir.’

Hervey laughed. ‘Ale for all who drank your farewell! I’ve never heard it thus expressed.’

‘No, sir. I means it proper. My uncle’s landlord o’ the Marquis o’ Granby in Bromley.’

Hervey was a shade discomfited. ‘I beg your pardon, Corporal Acton. My compliments to you. An admirably named place.’

Fairbrother had detached himself from the marching repartee, and was first to notice the activity off-shore. ‘Look yonder.’ He pointed to the gunships off the west side of the isthmus.

They had lowered small-boats, and the crews were pulling hard. It was not yet full light but the towing ropes were clearly visible. It wouldn’t take long to swing the ships on their moorings so the guns could bear.

‘Smart work,’ said Hervey. ‘As we observed yesterday, they’ll have targets aplenty if the Turk obliges and stands fast in the open much longer … What do you estimate their number?’

‘I confess I’ve never seen the like,’ said Fairbrother. ‘Who knows how many stand to the rear. Our perspective on foot is very limited. Thousands?’

‘What say you, Corporal Acton?’

Even though observation was the dragoon’s business, and the tricks of the trade practised every field day, it was still a tall order. Yet Acton was undaunted. He shielded his eyes (the sun was now gathering strength) and calmly surveyed the distant ‘enemy’.

‘There appears to be three distinct musters of infantry, sir. If that’s three battalions, suppose upwards, say, of two thousand? The cavalry I can’t make out at all well, but there must be half that number at least. And where else would all them we saw with the Cossacks have gone?’

‘So your report would be?’

‘Estimate two thousand infantry in brigade, with cavalry supports at least one thousand, and artillery troop.’

‘Excellent summation. There must also be a battalion in the trenches, else the fighting would not be so active. We must count on there being four thousand in all.’

‘And we are, what, fifteen hundred?’ asked Fairbrother (‘we’ seemed natural enough, marching in line with a Russian brigade – and he was certain the Turks would make no distinction).

‘And a thousand in the redoubts,’ replied Hervey.

‘The odds are not oppressive, then, as long as yonder general knows his business?’

‘My sentiments entirely. We shall just have to see whether Wachten is as capable of manoeuvring as he is of organizing.’

They tramped on to the growing rattle of musketry and, now that it was light enough to lay, the Turk guns which had opened fire with solid shot at the redoubt. Hervey was relishing the novelty – except for the stench. The smell of horses was sweet; that of the rekrut was not. The stale sweat of a winter unwashed, the pungent exhilaration and fear of coming battle, the sulphurous flatulence, the belching onion breath laced with kvas – he had thought his nose inured to rankness until now.

‘Infantry,’ he said, sighing. ‘If the Turks would only oblige, I’d wheel the entire line to the right and march them into that sea. I never smelled anything so foul in so fair a place.’

Fairbrother shook his head. ‘A maroon’s cabin wouldn’t stink as bad.’

‘The powder-smoke will be a fumigatory. I’d welcome some musketry for medicinal purposes alone.’

Hervey could hardly suppose, though, that an English brigade would smell much sweeter in the circumstances – not, obviously, of kvas, and possibly not of onions, but there would be something just as rank. In other respects he imagined things would be much the same; these Russians advanced at a slower pace – about eighty to the minute, and a shorter step – but infantry were infantry.

He began calculating: the step was a foot and a half, he reckoned (red-coats managed two); eighty to the minute meant a hundred and twenty feet – forty yards – in the minute; there was half a mile till volleying range – so twenty minutes, say. He took out his watch and marked the time. Strange the things that were possible on foot.

The regiments began singing, the Pavlovsk first – Preobrazhensky, at once recognizable. Then the Kozlov, fullthroated, a swaggering tune he didn’t know but that made them all step out and quicken pace, so that the Pavlovsk’s fifers and time-beaters had to speed theirs to keep the dressing. General Wachten turned in the saddle, smiling broadly and encouraging the beat with clenched fist. One of the Kozlov rekruty, short-legged, short-backed, skipped out of the front rank and began a capering Hopak along the line, urged on by the officers.

‘Not for the Horse Guards, I’d wager,’ said Fairbrother, bemused. ‘But what a joyous way to go to your death.’

‘Perhaps I shall instruct the Fifty-third to sing on the march.’

‘Did the army sing at Waterloo?’

‘The French did, when Bonaparte reviewed them. I don’t recall any on our side of the field.’

They were across the isthmus now, with a breeze bringing a taste of the sea sparkling blue behind them, the sun full up. And then the gunships began their cannonade – thunderous unison and clouds of smoke. The left flank of the Kozlov were now skirting the breastworks of ‘B’ Redoubt, singing louder against the roar of the battery and the broadsides. Flankers fell to fragments of Turk shell which exploded long; the singing faltered momentarily but picked up with renewed determination.

Turk and Russian were now in full view of each other, a furlong and a half at most. Wachten halted the advance and trotted over to where the Kozlov’s commanding officer stood with his adjutant and drummer.

Hervey watched as the general’s hand indicated a change of direction. ‘I believe he intends they enter the trenches,’ he said, with a sufficient note of surprise to alert Corporal Acton.

‘Going with ’em, sir?’

‘I trust not,’ said Fairbrother, before Hervey could reply.

‘No. There’d be nothing to see except at close quarter. I want to observe what the general does. I don’t see his purpose in entering the trenches.’

But that was not what Wachten had instructed them to do – only to present a flank while the rest of the line advanced.

The singing stopped abruptly as the battalion officers began the complicated evolution of forming left at the halt.

‘Would not wheeling be quicker?’ asked Fairbrother.

‘You were the infantryman, not I – but I’ve watched a line take an age to dress when it had wheeled too tightly.’

It was five minutes nevertheless before Wachten was satisfied that his flank was properly protected, and he could give the order ‘Forward!’ to the Pavlovsk.

Hervey now found himself on the left of the line. Shot hissed this way and that at fifty yards. The Turk gunners had not yet changed their lay from the redoubt; it would be an easy switch when they did.

‘I’d say Wachten’s been deuced adroit. If he can fright off yonder Turks, as Vedeniapine did yesterday, likely as not he’ll bolt the ones in the trenches without a fight. I wonder what he’ll have our Cossack friends do?’

He glanced back to where the Cossacks stood with what he imagined must be uncommon patience, waiting for the infantry to gain ground. Had Wachten given them licence to act as they saw fit?

The Pavlovsk were now at volleying range – two hundred yards – but there was no sign of the Turk muskets presenting, or the guns switching and changing to case-shot. They simply stood their ground as if on parade.

‘They don’t seem to be frighted this time,’ said Fairbrother coolly, like a spectator at a field day.