Charles Lever - Maurice Tiernay, Soldier of Fortune

Although the cavalry squadrons I was despatched to overtake had quitted Nancy four hours before, I came up with them in less than an hour, and inquiring for the officer in command, rode up to the head of the division. He was a thin, gaunt-looking, stern-featured man, who listened to my message without changing a muscle.

‘Who sent you with this order?’ said he.

‘A general officer, sir, whose name I don’t know, but who told me to take his own horse and follow you.’

‘Did he tell you to kill the animal, sir?’ said he, pointing to the heaving flanks and shaking tail of the exhausted beast.

‘He bolted with me at first, major, and having cleared the ditch of the boulevard, rode away with me.’

‘Why, it’s Colonel Mahon’s Arab, Aleppo,’ said another officer; ‘what could have persuaded him to mount an orderly on a beast worth ten thousand francs?’

I thought I’d have fainted, as I heard these words; the whole consequences of my act revealed themselves before me, and I saw arrest, trial, sentence, imprisonment, and Heaven knew what afterwards, like a panorama rolling out to my view.

‘Tell the colonel, sir,’ said the major, ‘that I have taken the north road, intending to cross over at Beaumont; that the artillery trains have cut up the Metz road so deeply, cavalry cannot travel; tell him I thank him much for his politeness in forwarding this despatch to me; and tell him, that I regret the rules of active service should prevent my sending back an escort to place yourself under arrest for the manner in which you have ridden – you hear, sir?’

I touched my cap in salute.

‘Are you certain, sir, that you have my answer correctly?’

‘I am, sir.’

‘Repeat it, then.’

I repeated the reply, word for word, as he spoke it.

‘No, sir,’ said he as I concluded; ‘I said for unsoldier-like and cruel treatment to your horse.’

One of his officers whispered something in his ear, and he quietly added —

‘I find that I had not used these words, but I ought to have done so; give the message, therefore, as you heard it at first.’

‘Mahon will shoot him, to a certainty,’ muttered one of the captains.

‘I’d not blame him,’ joined another; ‘that horse saved his life at Quiberon, when he fell in with a patrol; and look at him now!’

The major made a sign for me to retire, and I turned and set ont towards Nancy, with the feelings of a convict on the way to his fate.

If I did not feel that these brief records of a humble career were ‘upon honour,’ and that the only useful lesson a life so unimportant can teach, is the conflict between opposing influences, I might possibly be disposed to blink the avowal, that, as I rode along towards Nancy, a very great doubt occurred to me as to whether I ought not to desert! It is a very ignoble expression; but it must out. There were not in the French service any of those ignominious punishments which, once undergone, a man is dishonoured for ever, and no more admissible to rank with men of character than if convicted of actual crime; but there were marks of degradation, almost as severe, then in vogue, and which men dreaded with a fear nearly as acute – such, for instance, as being ordered for service at the Bagne de Brest, in Toulon – the arduous duty of guarding the galley-slaves, and which was scarcely a degree above the condition of the condemned themselves. Than such a fate as this, I would willingly have preferred death. It was, then, this thought that suggested desertion; but I soon rejected the unworthy temptation, and held on my way towards Nancy.

Aleppo, if at first wearied by the severe burst, soon rallied, while he showed no traces of his fiery temper, and exhibited few of fatigue; and as I walked along at his side, washing his mouth and nostrils at each fountain I passed, and slackening his saddle-girths to give him freedom, long before we arrived at the suburbs he had regained all his looks and much of his spirit.

At last we entered Nancy about nightfall, and, with a failing heart, I found myself at the gate of the ducal palace. The sentries suffered me to pass unmolested, and entering, I took my way through the courtyard, towards the small gate of the garden, which, as I had left it, was unlatched.

It was strange enough, the nearer I drew towards the eventful moment of my fate, the more resolute and composed my heart became. It is possible, thought I, that in a fit of passion he will send a ball through me, as the officer said. Be it so – the matter is the sooner ended. If, however, he will condescend to listen to my explanation, I may be able to assert my innocence, at least so far as intention went. With this comforting conclusion, I descended at the stable door. Two dragoons in undress were smoking, as they lay at full length upon a bench, and speedily arose as I came up.

‘Tell the colonel he’s come, Jacques,’ said one, in a loud voice, and the other retired; while the speaker, turning towards me, took the bridle from my hand, and led the animal in, without vouchsafing a word to me.

‘An active beast that,’ said I, affecting the easiest and coolest indifference. The soldier gave me a look of undisguised amazement, and I continued —

‘He has had a bad hand on him, I should say – some one too flurried and too fidgety to give confidence to a hot-tempered horse.’

Another stare was all the reply.

‘In a little time, and with a little patience, I’d make him as gentle as a lamb.’

‘I’m afraid you’ll not have the opportunity,’ replied he significantly; ‘but the colonel, I see, is waiting for you, and you can discuss the matter together.’

The other dragoon had just then returned, and made me a sign to follow him. A few paces brought us to the door of a small pavilion, at which a sentry stood; and having motioned to me to pass in, my guide left me. An orderly sergeant at the same instant appeared, and beckoning to me to advance, he drew aside a curtain, and pushing me forward, let the heavy folds close behind me; and now I found myself in a richly furnished chamber, at the farther end of which an officer was at supper with a young and handsome woman. The profusion of wax-lights on the table – the glitter of plate, and glass, and porcelain – the richness of the lady’s dress, which seemed like the costume of a ball – were all objects distracting enough, but they could not turn me from the thought of my own condition; and I stood motionless, while the officer, a man of about fifty, with dark and stern features, deliberately scanned me from head to foot. Not a word did he speak, not a gesture did he make, but sat, with his black eyes actually piercing me. I would have given anything for some outbreak of anger, some burst of passion, that would have put an end to this horrible suspense, but none came; and there he remained several minutes, as if contemplating something too new and strange for utterance. ‘This must have an end,’ thought I – ‘here goes’; and so, with my hand in salute, I drew myself full up, and said —

‘I carried your orders, sir, and received for answer that Major Roquelard had taken the north road advisedly, as that by Beaumont was cut up by the artillery trains; that he would cross over to the Metz Chaussée as soon as possible; that he thanked you for the kindness of your warning, and regretted that the rules of active service precluded his despatching an escort of arrest along with me, for the manner in which I had ridden with the order.’

‘Anything more?’ asked the colonel, in a voice that sounded thick and guttural with passion.

‘Nothing more, sir.’

‘No further remark or observation?’ ‘None, sir – at least from the major.’

‘What then – from any other?’

‘A captain, sir, whose name I do not know, did say something.’