Judith smiled. ‘I know how much you value him, Colonel. But go on!’
‘Well, we couldn’t hold the position against such odds, of course. Things were beginning to look devilish black, but Picton came up in the nick of time, which pretty well doubled our strength. But even so it was a ticklish business. The Highland Brigade were cut to pieces, poor devils, but they didn’t yield an inch. However, as I told you the Brunswickers came up from Nivelles, then the Nassauers, and Van Merlen’s cavalry. That was when I left.’ He glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece, swallowed the rest of his tea, and jumped up. ‘I must get back. You’ll be hearing more news, I daresay: someone is sure to be sent in. Goodbye—don’t be alarmed! All’s well, you know.’
He hurried away, and not long after he had gone the noise of the firing, which had sounded closer in the stillness of the evening grew more desultory, and by ten o’clock had ceased. Worth came in, saying that the population of Brussels was still wandering about the ramparts and the Park. Great anxiety was being felt on all sides to know the result of the action. No news had as yet come in; some stout-hearted persons were maintaining that the Allies must have held their ground; others, in a state of growing uneasiness, were preparing to remove instantly to Antwerp.
The ladies gave him an account of Canning’s visit, recalling as well as they were able his description of the battlefield. Worth listened intently, exclaiming when Barbara spoke of the arrival of the Brunswick and Nassau contingent: ‘Then none of our cavalry are engaged!’
‘No. Colonel Canning mentioned only General Picton’s division.’
He looked serious, and said briefly: ‘It is an ill-managed business!’
‘The Colonel said the French had taken us by surprise.’
‘It may well have been so. From what De Lancey told me this morning, it is plain that Wellington, as late as then, was expecting the attack to be directed on his right. Do you say the Prussians have also been engaged?’
‘Yes, at Ligny, but he could not tell us how the day had gone with them. He said Napoleon himself was opposed to them.’
‘I would not give a penny for their chances of success!’ he said. ‘The question will be, can Wellington maintain his communications with Blücher? It is plain Bonaparte has struck this blow in the endeavour to get between our forces. By God, it should be a lesson to those who have been saying he had lost his old genius! It is masterly! The rapidity of his march from Paris, his strategy in launching the attack at our point of junction with Blücher—it is something quite in his old style: one cannot but admire him! If he can succeed in defeating the Prussians, and Ney in carrying our position, it will be a serious business.’ He observed Judith’s pallor, and dropped his hand on her shoulder, saying more quietly: ‘There is no need for alarm. If the day has gone against us we are bound to hear of it in time for me to drive you and the boy to safety. I have given orders in the stables: you need be under no apprehension.’
Barbara, who had walked over to the window, turned, and said in her lively way: ‘Confound you, are you one of the croakers? I’ll tell you what: I have a very good mind to put my horses up for sale, and so burn my boats!’
‘I admire your spirit,’ he said, with a slight smile.
‘You need not,’ she replied. ‘I have merely a shocking love of excitement. Consider! In spite of all my adventures I was never till now in danger of falling into the hands of the French. It is something quite out of the common way, and therefore enchanting!’
Judith was obliged to smile at her nonsense, but said protestingly: ‘How can you talk so?’
‘The devil! How else should I talk? You know, if the French should come I fancy we shall make a hit with them. There is no denying that we are a handsome pair. Neither of us, I am persuaded, need look lower than a Marshal at the very least.’
Such raillery, though it might bring a blush to Judith’s cheeks, had the effect of relieving the oppression of her spirits. Nothing more was said of the chances of defeat, and presently Worth went out again to see if any further news had arrived from Quatre-Bras.
He came back a little after eleven, and found that Judith and Barbara were still up. ‘I called at Creevey’s,’ he said. ‘Hamilton had been in during the evening on an errand for General Barnes, and of course dropped in on Creevey, to see Miss Ord. The result was still uncertain when he left the field, but Creevey got the impression from him that it was going in our favour. Charles was safe when he left the field: he saw him trying to rally the Belgians, who had had enough, just as he came away. Hamilton reports them as having done well at the start, but they won’t stand like our own men. The worst, so far, is that the Duke of Brunswick has fallen. He was killed by a ball passing through his hand to his heart. Hamilton did not mention many of the casualties. The Highlanders have suffered most. Fassiefern and Macara have both fallen; young Hay has gone, too; but I heard of no one else whom we know.’
‘Hay!’ Barbara lifted her hand to shade her eyes for a moment. ‘That boy! Ah, how wanton, how damnable! But go on! If Hay was present, Maitland’s brigade must have come up. Could you get no news of Harry?’
‘No; Creevey was positive Hamilton mentioned only Hay, and one other, whose name I forget.’
Judith said: ‘Depend upon it, he would have told Mr Creevey had your brother been killed.’
‘He might not know. But never mind that! What else could you discover, Lord Worth? Shall we hold our ground?’
‘I see no reason why we should not. It appears that reinforcements have been arriving ever since five o’clock. The most serious part of the business is that we have no cavalry there worth mentioning. The infantry has done magnificently, however: Hamilton told Creevey that nothing could equal their endurance. Only their steadiness under the onslaughts of Kellermann’s cuirassiers saved the day for us at one point. The Belgian and Brunswick cavalry were scattered; our whole position was completely turned, and might have been carried but for the Highlanders—I think he said the 92nd, but I might mistake. The Duke directed them in person, charging them not to fire until he gave the word. They obeyed him implicitly, though he allowed the cuirassiers to come within thirty paces before giving the order for a volley. The attack was completely repulsed, Kellermann drawing off in a good deal of disorder. Hamilton seems to have been full of enthusiasm for the Duke’s coolness. It appears he has been everywhere at once, exposing himself in the most reckless fashion.’
‘Surely he should not do so.’
‘So I think, but you will not get his officers to agree. Even those who dislike him will tell you that the sight of his long nose among them does more to steady the troops than the arrival of a division to support them. He seems to bear a charmed life. What do you think of his being nearly taken by a party of Lancers when the Brunswick Hussars broke under the musketry-fire? He was forced to gallop for his life, made for a ditch lined by the Gordon Highlanders, sang out to them to lie still, and cleared the fence, bayonets and all!’
They remained for some time discussing the news, but the clock striking midnight soon recalled them to a sense of the lateness of the hour. All sound of firing had died away at ten o’clock; nothing had been heard of since; and they could not but believe that if a defeat had been suffered news of it must have reached them. Judith and Barbara went up to their rooms, but they had scarcely begun to undress when the noise of heavy carriages rumbling over the cobbles reached their ears. Nothing could be seen from the windows but people running out of doors to find out what was going on. Shouts and cries seemed to come from all parts of the town; and Judith, pausing only to fling a wrap round her shoulders, hurried to find Worth. He had not yet come upstairs, and called to her from the ground-floor to do nothing until he had discovered what was happening. He went out; Barbara joined Judith in the salon, and they sat in a state of apprehension that made it impossible for either to utter anything but a few occasional, disjointed sentences.
They were soon roused from this condition by the necessity of calming the ser
vants, some of whom were hysterical with fright. Barbara went out into the hall among them, and very soon restored order. While Judith occupied herself with reassuring those whose alarm had had the effect of bereaving them of all power of speech or of action, she dealt in a more drastic manner with the rest, swearing at the butler, and emptying jugs of water over any fille de chambre unwise enough to fall into a fit of hysterics.
By the time Worth returned, the household was quiet, and Barbara had gone back into the salon with Judith, who had temporarily forgotten her own fears in amusement at her guest’s ruthless methods.
Worth brought reassuring tidings. The noise they had heard had been caused by a long train of artillery, passing through the town on its way to the battlefield. The panic had arisen from a false notion having got about that the train was in retreat. People had rushed out of their houses in every stage of undress; a rumour that the French were coming had spread like wildfire; and the greatest confusion reigned until it became evident, even to the most foolish in the crowd, that the artillery was moving, not away from the field of action but towards it.
‘Is that all?’ exclaimed Barbara. ‘Well, if there is no immediate need for us to become heroines we may as well go to bed. I, at any rate, shall do so.’
‘Oh,’ said Judith, with a little show of playfulness, ‘you need not think that I shall be behind you in sangfroid: you have put me quite on my mettle!’
Goodnights were exchanged; both ladies retired again to their rooms, each with a much better opinion of the other than she had had at the beginning of what, in retrospect, seemed to have been the longest day of her life.
Nineteen
The night was disturbed. Many of the Bruxellois seemed to be afraid to go to bed, and spent the hours sitting in their houses with ears on the prick, ready to run out into the streets at the smallest alarm. Just before dawn a melancholy cortège entered the town, bearing the Duke of Brunswick’s body. Numbers of spectators saw it pass through the streets. The sable uniforms of the Black Brunswickers, the grim skull-and-crossbones device upon their caps and the grief in their faces, awed the thin crowds into silence. A feeling of dismay was created; when the sad procession had passed, people dispersed slowly, some to wander about in an aimless fashion till daylight, others returning to their houses to lie down fully clothed upon their beds or to drop uneasily asleep in chairs.
Between five and six in the morning, after an interval of quiet, commotion broke out again. A troop of Belgian cavalry, entering by the Namur Gate, galloped through the town in the wildest disorder, overturning market-carts, thundering over the cobbles, their smart green uniforms white with dust and their horses foaming. They had all the appearance of men hotly pursued, and scarcely drew rein in their race through the town to the Ninove Gate. All was panic; they were shouting: ‘Les Français sont ici!’ and the words were immediately taken up by the terrified crowds who saw them pass. The French were said to be only a few miles outside the town, the Allied Army in full retreat before them. Distracted Belgians ran to collect their more precious belongings, and then wandered about, carrying the oddest collection of goods, not knowing where to go, or what to do. Women became hysterical, filles de chambre rushing into hotel bedrooms to rouse sleepy visitors with the news that the French were at the gates; mothers clasping their children in their arms and screaming at their husbands to transport them instantly to safety. The drivers of the carts and the wagons drawn up in the Place Royale caught the infection; no sooner had the cavalry flashed through the great square than they set off down every street, rocking and lurching over the pavé in their gallop for the Ninove Gate. In a few minutes the Place was deserted, except for the people who still drifted about, spreading the dreadful news, or begging complete strangers for the hire of a pair of horses; and for a few market-carts driven into the town by stolid peasants in sabots and red night-caps, who seemed scarcely to understand what all the pandemonium was about.
Many of the English visitors behaved little better. Some of those who, on the night of the 15th, had stoutly declared their intention of remaining in Brussels, now ordered their carriages, or, if they possessed none, hurried about the town trying to engage horses to procure passages on the canal track-boats. For the most part, however, the flight of a troop of Belgic cavalry did not rouse much feeling of alarm in British breasts. Ladies busied themselves, as they had done the previous day, with preparations for the wounded, and if there were some who thought the cessation of all gun-fire ominous, there were others who considered it to be a sure sign that all must be well.
Judith and Barbara again went to the Comtesse de Ribaucourt’s. On entering the house Judith encountered Georgiana Lennox, who came up to her with a white face and trembling lips, trying to speak calmly on some matter of a consignment of blankets. She was scarcely able to control her voice, and broke off to say: ‘Forgive me, this is foolish! Only it is so dreadful—I don’t seem able to stop crying.’
Judith took her hand, saying with a good deal of concern: ‘Oh, my poor child! Your brothers—?’
‘Oh no, no!’ Georgiana replied quickly. ‘But Hay has been killed!’ She made an effort to control herself. ‘He was almost like one of my brothers. It is stupid—I know he would not care for that, but I can’t get it out of my head how cross I was with him for being so glad to be going into action.’ She tried to smile. ‘I scolded him. I wouldn’t dance with him any more, and then I never saw him again. He went away so excited, and now he’s been killed, and I didn’t even say goodbye to him.’
Judith could only press her hand. Georgiana said rather tightly: ‘I can’t believe he’s dead, you know. He said: “Georgy! We’re going to war! Was there ever anything so splendid?” And I was cross.’
‘Dearest Georgy, you mustn’t think of that. I am sure he did not.’
‘Oh no! I know I’m being silly. Only I wish I had not scolded him.’ She brushed her hand across her eyes. ‘He was General Maitland’s aide-de-camp, you know. Now that he has been killed William feels that he must rejoin Maitland, and he is not fit to do so.’
‘Your brother! Oh, he cannot do so. His arm is still in a sling, and he looks so ill!’
‘That is what Mama feels, but my father agrees that it is William’s duty to go to General Maitland. I do not know what will come of it.’ Her lips quivered again; she said inconsequently: ‘Do you remember how beautifully the Highlanders danced at our ball? They are all dead.’
‘Oh, hush, my dear, don’t think of such things! Not all!’
‘Most of them. They were cut to pieces by the cuirassiers. They say the losses in the Highland brigade are terrible.’
Judith could not speak. She had seen the Highlanders march out of Brussels in the first sunlight, striding to war to the music of their own fifes, and the memory of that proud march brought a lump into her throat. She pressed Georgiana’s hand again, and released it, turning away to hide the sudden rush of tears to her own eyes.
She and Barbara returned home a little after noon, to find that Worth had just come back from visiting Sir Charles Stuart. He was able to tell them that an aide-de-camp had ridden in during the morning, having left the field at 4 am. He reported that after a very sanguinary battle the Allied Army had remained in possession of the ground. Towards the close of the action the cavalry had come up, having been delayed by mistaken orders. It had not been engaged on the 16th, but would certainly be in the thick of it today, if the French attack were renewed, as the Duke was confident it would be.
The ladies had hardly taken off their hats when the sound of cheering reached the house; they ran out to the end of the street, where a crowd had collected, and were in time to see a number of French prisoners being marched under guard towards the barracks of Petit Château.
But the heartening effect of this sight was not of long duration. The next news that reached Brussels was that the Prussians had been defeated at Ligny, and were in full retreat. The intelligence brought a fresh feeling of dismay, which was made the more p
rofound by the arrival, a little later, of the first wagon-loads of wounded. In a short time the streets were full of the most pitiable sights. Men who were able to walk had dragged themselves to Brussels on foot all through the night, some managing to reach the town, many collapsing on the way, and dying by the roadside from the effects of their wounds.
Except among those whom panic had rendered incapable of any rational action, the arrival of the wounded made people forget their own alarms in the more pressing need to do what they could to alleviate the sufferings of the soldiers. Ladies who had never encountered more unnerving sights than a pricked finger or the graze on a child’s knee, went out into the streets with flasks of brandy and water, and the shreds of petticoats torn up to provide bandages; and stayed until they dropped from fatigue, stanching the blood that oozed from ghastly wounds; providing men who were dying on the pavements with water to bring relief to their last moments; rolling blankets to form pillows for heads that lolled on the cobbles; collecting straw to make beds for those who, unable to reach their own billets, had sunk down on the road; and accepting sad, last tokens from dying men who thought of wives, and mothers, and sweethearts at home, and handed to them a ring, a crumpled diary, or a laboriously scrawled letter.
Judith and Barbara were among the first to engage on this work. Neither had ever come into anything but the most remote contact with the results of war; Judith was turned sick by the sight of blood congealed over ugly contusions, of the scraps of gold lace embedded in gaping wounds, of dusty rags twisted round shattered joints, and of grey, pain-racked faces lying upturned upon the pavement at her feet. There was so little that could be accomplished by inexpert hands; the patient gratitude for a few sips of water of men whose injuries were beyond her power to alleviate brought the tears to her eyes. She brushed them away, spoke soothing words to a boy crumpled on the steps of a house, and sobbing dryly, with his head against the railings; bound fresh linen round a case-shot wound; spent all the Hungary Water she owned in reviving men who had covered the weary miles from Quatre-Bras only to fall exhausted in the gutters of Brussels.