Iain Gale - Rules of War

Marlborough glared at him with steely green eyes. ‘Oh, James. I do so wish you were not always so very right.’

Van Goslinga had re-entered the great hall now and smiled insipidly at the duke. Marlborough hissed, under his breath: ‘That man again. That odious little man.’

Not hearing the comment, the Dutch liaison officer smiled ingratiatingly. ‘Your Grace, the deputies and magistrates would meet with you now, if you please.’

Together, Hawkins, Marlborough and Cadogan were shown through into the grand salon of the castle. The painted and gilded walls were hung with vividly coloured Brussels tapestries depicting scenes of courtly life in the Middle Ages and portraits of the Dukes of Brabant. In the centre of the room stood a long table and around it sat some twenty middle-aged and elderly men in full wigs. Hawkins noticed that, while those on the right had the pale complexion of northerners, those seated to the left were more swarthy and sported moustaches. All were dressed in sombre black coats. It looked to the duke and Hawkins something like a meeting of physicians, but where in the centre of the table there should have been a cadaver ready for dissection there lay sheaves of paper and charters sealed with red wax and on top of them the swords of the deputies and the Spanish officials, their hilts pointing deliberately in the direction of the victorious British general.

As Marlborough entered the men rose as one and made low bows over the table. The duke returned their greeting. The man nearest to him, a short, pale Dutchman with a small white goatee beard, spoke in mannered English.

‘We are a proud people, Your Grace. For four hundred years we have resisted French tyranny. For two hundred years we have been ruled by the Hapsburgs. Since 1515 by the Spanish. Under Spain our people were massacred for their refusal to accept the Catholic doctrine. We fought them for eighty years, until 1648. For the last thirty years we have been fighting against the French King Louis. The French bombarded our city of Brussels for three days in 1695. They reduced it to nothing – only the town hall survived. But from the ashes we have built the city you see today. We are survivors, My Lord Duke, and with your help we have thrown off the yoke of French rule. We pledge allegiance now to Charles III and ask you to acknowledge a new united Belgian state.’

Marlborough bowed. ‘Thank you, mijnheer. I am a general, not a statesman. But I will accept your declaration and communicate it to my queen in England. I am aware of your country’s long agony under King Louis. I believe that our late victory has truly brought that to an end. I assure you that there will not be the least change in regard to religion. I intend to recall the ancient charter well known as the “Joyous Entry of Brabant”. I assure you that my men will be kept in firm control. They will not plunder or devastate your land or take your goods and they will pay due respect to your people. If they do not then they shall suffer for it. Any man – be he common soldier or officer – found stealing so much as a cherry from one of your orchards shall pay with his life. It will be death without mercy, gentlemen. Although I trust that I know my men well enough to say that I shall not need to implement such a penalty.’

As one the deputies, magistrates and Spaniards rose to their feet and applauded Marlborough.

The Duke smiled and as he did so inclined his head to the side in a whisper: ‘I pray to God, Hawkins, that we can stay true to our word.’

‘Oh, you need have no fear of that, sir. The men’ll do whatever you desire them to. The punishment is only for show. They wouldn’t dare.’

Steel leaned against the wall of the house and, gazing into the farmyard, watched the man, Baynes, a wily country boy from the Scottish borders, near the town of Jedburgh. He was wrestling with two wiry yellow legs, attempting to avoid the claws as he manoeuvred them into his haversack.

Unaware that he was being observed, Baynes was muttering half to himself and half to the chicken which, still alive, he was determined to conceal. ‘C’mon you little bugger. One more push. Just one wee heave and in you go. Get your bloody head in there.’ The bird, its head covered by cloth, panicked and nipped the Grenadier on the forefinger. ‘Ow! Ye little bugger, I’ll give you something to nip about. I was only going to eat yer legs but now I’ll boil the lot of you. Get in there will you.’

‘Having trouble, Baynes?’

The man froze and slowly turned towards Steel: ‘Ah. Yes. I can explain, sir. It was fair game, sir. I just found her walking about. And you yourself, sir, heard the good man telling us that we were to share anything in the village.’

Steel raised his eyebrows. ‘So you, Baynes, being a kindly sort of a man, thought, “Now wouldn’t that be a fine mascot for the regiment? I’ll just take her to Colonel Farquharson and the adjutant and save her from the pot.” Am I right?’

‘How you do it sir, I don’t know. Quite right, Captain Steel, sir. Right you are again.’

‘By rights, I should have you hanged, Baynes. In Bavaria you would most certainly have been hanged. There the duke decreed that anyone found stealing anything would be subject to punishment by death.’

Baynes was shaking now. ‘Stealing? me, sir? No sir. Not stealing. Not me.’

‘Yes, Baynes. Stealing … Now put the bloody chicken back where you found it and we’ll say no more. Now get back to the company and wait. And don’t worry – I’ll find you some rations.’

Three hours later, his belly full of roast chicken, Steel was awoken by a cry and then another. No light pierced the pitch-black of the night, but he did not need to see to know that something was not right. Reaching for his sword, he leapt to his feet and not bothering with his coat, despite the cold of the night, buckled the belt around his shirt.

‘Sarn’t?’ He sensed, rather than saw in the darkness, Slaughter’s large frame at his side.

‘Came from over there, sir. Edge of the village.’ Another cry. Higher in tone now and unmistakable as that of a man in agony.

‘Come on. Alarm. Company to arms!’

Around him in the darkness the Grenadiers began to rise and fumbled for their weapons. Quickly, as another cry rent the air, Steel and Slaughter, followed by the night-watch picquet, made their way through the silent streets towards it.

They turned down a narrow alley and emerged in a small square on the edge of the village. In the centre stood a cherry tree and around it were gathered some twenty of the village militia. All were armed, some with captured French-pattern muskets, but most with swords or knives. For a moment they seemed not to have noticed Steel and his men. And when they did, they smiled and nodded. Jan, their self-appointed officer walked forward. In his hand he held a short knife.

‘Ah, Captain Steel. Welcome. I am sorry that we did not invite you to our evening entertainment. I thought that your men were too tired. And we did not know we would have such sport tonight.’

Steel felt no offence at their lack of hospitality. This was not the sort of sport he cared for. Tied to the tree was a man in the uniform of a French officer. Another man was standing behind him, held fast by two villagers. The faces of both men were frozen in terror and Steel could see why. Beneath the flickering torchlight he counted six dead bodies lying sprawled on the cobbles. They too wore white uniforms and were covered in blood. None of the dead seemed to have had any weapons and the two officers had long since lost their swords. Clearly this was a party of lost and desperate Frenchmen who, looking for food, had had the misfortune to stumble into Wippendries. It had been a fatal mistake. From the positions of the bodies, the cuts they bore and the agonized expressions etched deep into the visible faces, he could see that this had been no struggle, but a careful massacre.