General Baron Charles von Alten, a lean, hard-bitten warrior, bent his stern, bright gaze upon George. ‘Vot’s dat you say? General Picton takes our vood for his division? I dink not!’
Knowing Alten, George did not think so either. He fell in behind him, and followed him back to his mule-train. Alten rode past it, and straight up to Picton. George heard him say: ‘Goot evening to you, General! Dere is von little mistake dat you make, I dink.’ ‘Quick, load up the mules!’ George said to his men. ‘Never mind staring! We’ll be off while we may.’
The wood was hastily loaded again, while a battle-royal raged at a little distance from the party. Alten never shouted, but the echoes of Picton’s roar pursued George’s party for quite some way. What was the outcome of the encounter, George never learned, for he left both irate Generals in the middle of their altercation, but not another word did he hear about sharing his loads with the 3rd division.
‘Such a time as I have had!’ he told Kincaid, whom he found presently, superintending the erection of his tent.
‘Such a time as you’ve had?’ interrupted Kincaid. ‘Such a time as I’ve had!’ ‘Why, what is the matter, old fellow?’
‘I snatch the first hour off duty I’ve had in a week to write a couple of letters in my tent,’ said Kincaid, ‘and before I’ve had time to dip my pen in the ink, I find myself wrapped up into a bundle with my tent-pole and tent, rolling on the ground, mixed up with the table and all my writing utensils, and the devil himself dancing hornpipes over my body!’ ‘But how-why?’ asked George, trying not to laugh, ‘What devil?’
‘It turned out to be two of ’em. Would you believe it, the whole scene-oh, don’t mind me! You laugh!-the whole scene was arranged by a couple of rascally donkeys in a frolicsome humour, who had been chasing each other about the neighbourhood till they tumbled into my tent with a force which drew every peg, and rolled the whole lot over on the top of me! And it was I who said that our troubles would be over when we reached this rattle-trap of a town!’
Chapter Seven. Skerrett
By the middle of July, the Light division was encamped on the Santa Barbara height above Vera, within ten miles of the French frontier. From Pampeluna, which they had left to the Spaniards, and a few British units, to blockade, they had marched north into the Pyrenees, plunging farther and farther into a wild, lovely country of valleys rich with olive groves and fruit-trees, and great stretches of Indian corn; and towering hills, whose lower slopes were thickly covered with chestnut-trees, feathery larches, and grey-stemmed beeches, and whose peaks were lost for six days out of seven in wreaths of cloud. There were rivers in the valleys, tumbling down from the mountainsides, and purling over rocky beds; the villages were better than in Spain, with larger houses, owned by a people who spoke the queer, unintelligible Basque language. When the foothills were passed, marching became more difficult, and sometimes, when only narrow sheep-tracks led up the steep mountain passes, dangerous, since a false step would send one hurtling down a precipice on to craggy outcrops of rock hundreds of feet below. But nobody cared a penny for that when wild strawberries grew beside the way, and every step carried one nearer to the frontier. The Johnny Petits had run back to France, and, by all accounts, their retreat had more closely resembled a rout than a retiring movement. It was said that King Joseph never drew rein until he reached St Jean de Luz. Poor Pepe Botellas! He had lost everything at Vittoria: his treasure, and his guns, and his love-letters, and even the support of his Imperial brother; and the last humiliation was not long delayed. Soult, the Marshal-Duke of Dalmatia, whom he had wanted the Emperor to disgrace, reached Bayonne on the 11th July to take command of the demoralized Armies of Spain, and with orders to place King Joseph under arrest, if the King should prove troublesome. There were to be no more separate commands in Spain, no more quarrels between jealous Marshals, no more vacillations of a puppet-king. Supreme, Soult was going to drive Lord Wellington out of the Pyrenees, over the Ebro, over the Douro, back to his Portuguese lines, just as soon as the great military storehouses at Bayonne could furnish him with artillery, ammunition, and fresh accoutrements for the troops.
But, meanwhile, Sir Thomas Graham was besieging the town and fortress of San Sebastian, on the coast; English convoys were landing supplies at Passages and Bilbao; and Lord Wellington’s army held all the passes from the coast to Roncesvalles: a forty-mile front as the crow flies, with Sir Rowland Hill holding the right wing, from Roncesvalles to Maya, and Graham the left, and with the Light division between them, maintaining their communications.
It was an odd situation, Vera: not as pleasant as Santesteban, where the Light Bobs had camped for a week, amongst the most charming surroundings, but decidedly better then Lesaca, four miles to the rear, where his lordship had fixed his headquarters. Lesaca was pretty enough, lying in a cup of the densely wooded hills, but it had the reputation of being a damp, unhealthy town, and it was certainly very dirty. The headquarters Staff complained that you could actually see the fleas hopping on the floors in all the houses, while the racket in the overcrowded streets was appalling. When you tried to concentrate your mind upon your work, ten to one someone would start killing a pig under your window, your landlord would begin to thresh his garnered wheat in the loft above your head, or a shrill-voiced street-seller would linger under your window, calling interminably: ‘Aqua ardente! Aqua ardente!’
There was nothing like that about Vera. It was a small town on the twisting Bidassoa river, which ran fast there, through irregular and often precipitous banks to the sea, not ten miles away. When the Light division had chased the French out of it, the whole valley of Vera became more or less neutral ground, where foraging parties from each army met on terms of perfect cordiality in their search for corn and timber. The Light division placed advanced pickets in the town, but their main body camped on the Santa Barbara height, by the ruins of a convent. In front of the position, a steep hill was held by the French. English and French sentries stood within pistol-shot of one another, but there was never the least unpleasantness, either on the heights or in the valley. Only raw troops committed the folly of driving in pickets for no purpose: the English and French veterans never dreamed of fretting each other uselessly; and since each held the other in respect, they were able to meet on neutral ground without any appearance of animosity.
From Santa Barbara, the most extensive views could be enjoyed, when the hill was not enveloped in fog. When the Light Bobs had first climbed up the slope, it had been a clear day, and far away to the left, misty in the distance, they had caught a glimpse of the sea. Such a shout as had gone up when the first man, hardly able to believe his eyes, had gasped: ‘Look! look!’ Nobody knew why the sight of the sea filled him with sudden excitement ‘I suppose it makes us think of home,’ said Captain Leach. ‘Island blood, eh? My fellows have been snuffing the air and swearing they can smell the salt. Docs it give you nostalgia, George?’
George shook his head. ‘No. I often think that to be living in England after this wild, romantic existence would not give me half as much satisfaction. Campaigning is the life for me. I have never felt such happiness since I became a soldier.’
‘The man’s mad!’ said Jack Molloy. ‘George, old fellow, you’ve got a touch of the sun!’ ‘He’s right,’ said Harry.
‘Nonsense, you’re both mad! Jonathan, too, because he thinks one trout stream constitutes paradise.’
Leach smiled, but said seriously: ‘Surtees tells me he saw a salmon, but failed to land him. If it had been anyone but Surtees, I should have disbelieved him, for I’ve never seen one. However,-’