A war! Victor blinked. "Now that you mention it," he said, "no."
XVII
A t Roland Kersauzon's order, French soldiers had seized a bridge over the Erdre, the river that formed the border between the French and English settlements (the English called it the Stour). They had to fight a brisk little skirmish to do it. Had they moved a couple of days later, enough enemy soldiers might have come south to forestall them.
"Do you see?" Roland said to anyone who would listen. "There is a lesson here. Speed counts. Even a small delay, and the English would hold a bridgehead on our soil, not the other way round."
Because he commanded the army, the other officers-and the sergeants, and the cooks, and the grooms, and anybody else who chanced to be within earshot-couldn't simply walk away from him. They had to listen to his words of wisdom. Some of them had to listen several times. He repeated himself without shame: most of the time, without noticing he was doing it.
Supply wagons rolled up from Cosquer and from Nouveau Redon. In days gone by, hunting could have kept a good part of the army fed. So old men insisted their fathers had told them, anyhow. But no one had seen a honker near the coast for many years. Oil thrushes hadn't vanished, but they were getting scarce, too. Even more ordinary ducks and geese had been heavily hunted.
And so Roland and his soldiers ate sausages and smoked pork and onions and hard cheese and biscuits baked almost hard enough to keep weevils out of them. They washed down the unappetizing food with vin tres ordinaire, and with beer that wasn't much better. Some of them drank from the Erdre instead. Roland discouraged that; it was more likely to lead to a flux of the bowels.
"There are towns upstream," he reminded the men-and reminded them, and reminded them. "Where do you think they empty their chamber pots? Into the river, naturellement. We ought to call it the Merdre, not the Erdre."
He was inordinately fond of the pun. Others who heard it smiled widely the first time, smiled politely the second time, and stopped smiling after that. Roland, who didn't keep track of who'd heard it and who hadn't, found his subordinates sadly lacking in a sense of humor.
Two drummer boys beat out a brisk tattoo as the main French force followed the skirmishers across the Erdre and into English territory. Roland Kersauzon rode across on a white horse. If a man was going to lead an army, he needed to be seen leading it. So thought Roland, along with every other European commander of the eighteenth century.
He paid a price. The gold braid and epaulets on his blue velvet jacket weighed almost as much as a back-and-breast of days gone by. More gold braid ornamented and weighed down his tricorn. The hat did shield his eyes from the sun, but it was heavy enough to make his neck sore. He sighed with relief every time he took it off.
He could have doffed it any time he chose. No one would have doubted who led the French settlers. He could have, but he didn't. He was as stern with himself as he was with the men in his charge.
They marched on, leaving a garrison at the bridge to make sure the English didn't nip in behind them and take it away. Roland felt very grand and martial. His soldiers seized livestock and supplies from the farms they passed. The army would eat better because of it.
Scouts rode in front of the main force. Kersauzon didn't want to get taken by surprise. He'd known for years that Englishmen weren't to be trusted. He didn't care to have them prove it against his army.
And so, when a sharp racket of musketry rang out up ahead, he called to the buglers: "Blow form line of battle. Then blow advance on the foe."
The horn calls rang out. The gap between the first and the second stretched longer than Roland would have liked. The French force was less thoroughly drilled than it might have been. Garrisons from several towns had been melded together to make an attacking force. They were brave enough-Kersauzon had no doubts about that-but they hadn't marched side by side for years. They'd be veterans by the time this campaign ended, but they weren't yet.
Roland rode forward with the advancing infantry to see what the trouble was. He didn't need long. The English had picked a spot where trees came close to the road on both sides and run up a barricade of logs and boulders there. They were shooting from behind it, which let a handful of men thwart a much larger number. Roland didn't think that was sporting, but the English settlers doubtless didn't care.
"We will give them a few volleys from the front," he said. "While we keep them busy, we will send men into the woods to either side. Once they flank the enemy out of his position, we will tear down the barricade and resume our advance."
He'd never commanded troops in battle before. Everything seemed bright and clear and obvious. He gave his orders with confidence. The soldiers eagerly obeyed. Confidence in a leader brought out confidence in his men.
His men approached the barricade. A couple of English settlers popped up and fired at them. One bullet missed. The other grazed a soldier in the leg. He had to fall out, but called to his comrades as they marched past: "Go on! Go get them! Don't worry-I'll be with you again soon!"
They moved to within sixty yards or so: close enough for a decisive volley. Then two blunt, ugly little cannon muzzles poked through cunningly concealed openings among the logs. They were three-pounders: light field guns that could keep up with cavalry on any reasonable ground.
A man cried out in English. Both guns belched fire and smoke at the same time. They also belched canister. At that range, they couldn't have missed if they tried. Men from the first three or four rows of French settlers fell as if scythed. The ones still standing looked around in surprise, as if wondering where their friends had gone. Some of them shot at the enemy. Most were too startled or too appalled.
Roland Kersauzon was appalled, too. A man who stopped canister at close range wasn't picturesquely wounded, as the man pinked by a musket ball had been. He was blown to rags, to bloody fragments a butcher's shop would have been ashamed to sell. And, no matter how mutilated he was, he didn't always die right away. The shrieks from maimed soldiers chilled the blood.
"Where are our cannon, Monsieur?" a lieutenant asked.
"They're coming up," Roland said unhappily. The line of march had got longer than it should have. He hadn't tightened up, for he hadn't expected to do any serious fighting for a while. There was another lesson: if you didn't act as if a battle might break out any second, you were making a mistake.
And that one had a corollary. Mistakes in wartime could be fatal. This one had been, for too many of his men. Only luck none of those lead balls tore into his own belly or smashed his skull.
"What do we do now, Monsieur?" the lieutenant asked. "Shall we charge the barricade while they reload?"
Too late, Roland learned caution. He shook his head. "No. If they have another gun waiting, they'll murder us." He turned to the bugler. "Blow fall back."
Although that horn call wasn't particularly mournful in and of itself, it seemed so to Kersauzon because of what it ordered. Fall back the French settlers did, dragging their wounded with them. Dead men and pieces of men lay where they'd fallen. The hot iron stink of blood fouled the air.
Would the English come out to attack? Would their cannon start firing roundshot, which could kill from much farther than canister? Whatever they did, they wouldn't enjoy it for long. Once the outflankers got behind them, they would have a thin time of it.
The lieutenant pointed at the barricade. "Monsieur, I believe they're pulling out!"
Roland raised a spyglass to his eyes. Like a ship captain's glass, or an astronomer's, it inverted the image while magnifying it. Sure enough, the glimpses of enemy soldiers the barrier gave him showed they were withdrawing. Either they were cowards or (more likely, he decided with regret) they'd figured out his plan and wouldn't wait around to be trapped.