"Bless you, Sir," says he, taking the bottle and drinking from it.
"Bless us all, Guerrette," I say, uncorking the next bottle and handing it to Laurent on my left.
We sit in a companionable circle on the green grass, chewing our bread and sausage and cheese as we pass the bottles around. The sun is not out and there is a heavy mist from the river, but still it is warm and we feel, for the moment, content, and that is all a poor soldier can ever hope for.
After a while, a man comes out of the Colonel's tent and signals to me. I get up.
"Get ready, lads, I think we're moving out." They groan and rise and shoulder their muskets and stand ready while I go down to see the Chief of Engineers.
"All right, Bouvier," says Colonel Maurais upon my entrance into his tent. His adjunct, a lieutenant splattered with mud, hands me two folded letters, one sealed with red wax, one sealed with blue. I take them and put them in my pouch.
"The blue one goes to the Emperor, with my compliments. And, since you will be riding through Marshal Murat's Cavalry Line on your way back, it will be no trouble for you to deliver the red one to him. I am sure he will be glad to know that we will be ready since he will be the first one over my bridge in the morning. Ride hard, young man."
I hit a brace, click my heels, bow, and leave.
We push on back toward our lines, hoping to reach them before dark. Things are going well—the men, rested and fed, are moving along at a steady pace, as is Mathilde. Denis did manage to find her some oats. I look forward to getting in my tent and going to sleep.
On our way we cross a field, and then come upon a road. The traveling there is easier, and I welcome it, but Laurent has other thoughts.
"We are too exposed here, Sir," he says, his eyes darting about, peering at the thick forest that lines either side of the road. "We could be ambushed. I don't like it. It's the poacher in me, Sir. Never let yourself be taken in the open, non."
I think on that but decide to stay on the road. "We will be back all the quicker, Corporal Laurent, and we have seen no sign of Prussians on our journey so far. I think they have all retreated north to get ready for the big battle. It will be all right, you'll see."
Laurent grunts in assent, but he does not look convinced. He directs Guerrette, Michaud, and Vedel to patrol out close to the encroaching woods.
As I ride along, my thoughts turn to Jaimy, and I pray once again for his recovery. Did it go well, Jaimy? Are you back on your feet again? Did you—
That's as far as I get on that line of thought.
"ANGRIFF! ERGREIFT SIE!"
A patrol of Prussian heavy cavalry bursts from the cover of the woods, helmets gleaming, sabers drawn and raised.
"Run, boys! Run!" I scream, as I wheel Mathilde about and try to flee. I draw my pistol to aim at the man charging at me, not ten yards away. I c*ck and fire, but Mathilde, startled by the sudden attack, rears back and my shot goes wide, merely nicking him on the side of his metal breastplate. Damn! I hear shots from my men, and from the edge of my vision, I think I see one of the Prussians slump forward in his saddle.
The man comes relentlessly on. I can see his clenched teeth, and I know he means to kill me and to smile as he does it. In terror, I drop the pistol and reach for my sword, but I have my hand only on its hilt as he raises his saber and starts the swing of the killing slash. Just then his leader riding by his side points his sword at me and shouts, "Halt, Günther! Den Offizier nehmen wir lebendig!"
The one named Günther changes his swing in midair, and instead of cutting my throat, slams down the heavy hilt of his sword on the side of my head. As my shako falls into the dirt and I slump forward against Mathilde's neck, my one thought is that they mean to take me alive. Dimly, I hear my men still shooting, and then the Prussian leader shouting, "Verschwinden wir! Schnell! Schnell!"
Then I don't know nothin' for a while.
***
When my senses return, I find my hands are bound behind my back and my head is throbbing like someone had slammed it with a sledgehammer. Indeed, someone had—that Günther has an arm powerful as the leg of an ox. I sit up on Mathilde, shake my head, and look about. There are only about eight of them—a small band of skirmishers out to make trouble on the flanks of the Grand Army ... and pick up what intelligence they can, and, oh they have picked up some here, no doubt, I think with growing dread, knowing what is in my messenger's pouch.
We pull up before a farmhouse where all dismount and I am pushed off Mathilde. I land on my back on the ground below and my breath is knocked out of me. I groan and try not to cry out in my pain and misery, but it is hard, so hard.
I am picked up and shoved in the doorway, where I trip over the sill and end up sprawled on the floor. I am quickly taken up by Günther and plunked in a chair that sits in front of a table. The officer in charge of the patrol stands at rigid attention next to me. On the table are spread maps, with words and arrows and numbers scribbled on them. An officer, with shaved head and gold on his shoulders, is seated there, and behind him is hung a flag—white with a black double-headed eagle on it, its talons clutching a brace of lightning bolts.
The man, who wears what I take to be the insignia of a major, glances up from the desk and looks at the officer with raised eyebrow.
"Ein Französischer Kurrier, Major Papen. Er hat Papiere bei sich!" the junior officer announces, putting my pouch on the table before his superior.
"Gute Arbeit, Leutnant Grasser," acknowledges the higher officer, plainly complimenting the junior man on his catch. He cracks open the letters and reads their contents.
"So," he asks me in French. "The bridge across the Saale is almost done, eh? Well, it is possible we might be able to concentrate some forces there to prevent the crossing of the Grand Army. What do you think of that?"
"I am only a poor messenger, M'sieur," I say. "They give me letters and I deliver them. That is all I do. I do not think of anything else. And I do not know of anything else." I hang my head at this, and try to look contrite.
Major Papen tosses the letters back on the table and says, "Leutnant Grasser. Schaffen Sie ihn raus hier. Erschiessen Sie de Mann." Günther, upon hearing this, puts his hand under my arm and lifts me up.
I don't understand the lingo, but to my horror, I think I get the gist of what he has just said—Dear God, that sounds an awful lot like—
"Take me out and shoot me, Sir? But you cannot. Je suis un soldat, a soldier, just like you, and I must be treated as such! I am not a spy! You cannot—"
"You have here in your pouch letters concerning dispositions of bridgework across one of the rivers of the Fatherland. How could you not be more of a spy? No, you shall be shot," he says, getting to his feet, pulling a pistol from his belt and cocking it. "And I shall personally administer the coup de grâce"
He nods to Günther and I am dragged out into the farmyard and stood up in the center of it.
The firing squad forms—four of them, standing in a line in front of me, preparing their muskets.
Oh, Lord, not here, not now...
Major Papen comes out of the farmhouse, his cocked pistol by his side.
"Soldaten! Anwesende waffen!" He shouts the order and four muskets are raised and pointed at my chest.
The Look. Mistress would expect me to put on the Look. I'll try, Mistress, I'll try ... I lift my chin and bring my eyelids down to half-mast, lips together, teeth apart. Jaimy, I...
"Abfeuern!" barks Papen.
CRRAACCKK!
Four muskets ire and I pitch forward into the dust. As I taste the dirt, a part of my numb mind wonders why I wasn't thrown back by the blast of the bullets, instead of forward. I look up and see that it was not my own breast that was shattered by that volley, but Major Papen's own head. He falls, half his face gone, his pistol by his side.
CLODHOPPERS! is the shout. Günther goes down along with several others. Then Lieutenant Grasser, clutching his neck where a bullet has penetrated his throat, kneels there choking on his own blood. Laurent lopes through the barnyard, and with his bayonet puts an end to Grasser's troubles.
I feel something at my wrists and they quickly fall free and I put my hands on the earth and push myself to my knees.
"Your shako, Sir." It is Denis Dufour, holding it out to me. Seeing me still confused, he puts a hand under my arm and pulls me to my feet. Still addled, I shove the hat on my head and yank the strap under my chin. "How could you have been so brave, Sir? Standing there like that with your head up and that look on your face..."
Brave? What...
"We've got to get out of here, M'sieur, they might be back at any time!" shouts Laurent, reloading.
My head clears. "My letters. I must get my letters. Dufour, see if you can find my horse. Corporal, keep a sharp watch. Vedel, Guerrette, see if that officer has any papers on him ... money, too. Check the others, also. Michaud, come with me." Stooping, I pick up the pistol that lies by Papen's dead hand and look down at his body—so you would put a bullet in my brain with this? Michaud and I go into the farmhouse.
A quick check shows no one in the room—I suspect the family that lives in this place is cowering upstairs—and I go over to pick up my dispatches and thrust them back in my pouch. "Michaud. Take that flag." I scoop up the maps and other papers from Papen's desk and shove them in there as well. They might prove of interest to the Emperor's staff.
Michaud grabs the flag by its pole, and we go back outside, where I'm glad to see Denis standing there holding Mathilde's reins. "M'sieur! There are other horses in back! Most of them saddled!"
Must have been the mounts of the party that ambushed us. "Good. Each of you men go back and get one," I say, as I take the reins and mount up. This is very good, I'm thinking, as I know my men must be exhausted.
Vedel hands me up several purses of coins and some papers, and I stuff all in my pouch and tie it shut.
Within a minute we all ride out of the farmyard and thunder down the road.
We ride the horses hard and encounter Prince Murat's outriders within two hours. We are challenged so I give the password, and we are quickly escorted to Murat's headquarters. The Grand Army has been ordered to stop its advance and is making camp, though nightfall is still a few hours off. I suspect that Napoléon doesn't want his army sitting exposed on the banks of the Saale, waiting for the bridge to be finished. I also surmise that he will be very glad to receive my dispatch from Colonel Maurais. We shall see.
"The seal on this has been broken, Lieutenant!" says Murat's aide-de-camp severely. "I trust you have an explanation?"
"Yes, Sir," I answer, standing stiffly at Attention under his angry gaze. "We were ambushed by a Prussian Cavalry patrol on our way here. I was taken prisoner. The dispatches from Colonel Maurais were discovered in my pouch and read by their officer, a Major Papen."
"That is not a good thing, messenger," he growls, reading the letter. "Now the enemy knows where and when we will cross the Saale."
As I am being dressed down, I notice out of the corner of my eye that my poachers, who are standing next to their puffing horses, are excitedly telling the tale of the day's events to others of their rank. They often point at me in the reporting of it.