Into the Valley of Death Page 14

  ‘The Brigade will advance! Trot – march!’

  At last. He dug in his heels and the line moved forward, advancing along the extreme edge of the field of fire. Some of the Light Division were starting to stand now, but others lay unmoving as the cavalry skirted round them, and one man had no head. Oliver forced himself to look past them to the burning village, at the flashes of gunfire in the vineyards, at the River Alma and the bank beyond, where finally they’d get their chance to fight back.

  Bolton’s mare reared in panic as the first shell exploded to right of them, and Oliver saw little red streaks raked across her flank from the flying splinters. He thought in sudden terror of his eyes, and tilted his head to the left, humping up his shoulder to protect his face. Roundshot blasted past, and poor Bobbin was in a frenzy, cutting right across him and cannoning into Ryder on the other side. For a second they were tangled, the three of them, Bolton crying ‘Bobbin, no!’ and Ryder’s deeper ‘Oh, for God’s sake!’ but something else was screaming, a high-pitched wail that ended in the explosion of a shell.

  Misty’s flank shook, the smoke turned black and red in front of his eyes, and a wet slurry splattered across his cheek. He kept going, scrubbing his sleeve furiously across his eyes, but when he took it away there was a gap to his side and Ryder was gone.

  He slewed in the saddle. A bloodied brown mound lay behind, 8th Hussars cursing and skipping round it, but protruding from beneath were patches of dark blue.

  ‘Keep steady, Oliver,’ said Lieutenant Grainger from behind. ‘You know the drill.’

  But it was Ryder. It was his friend, it was Ryder. ‘Sir, he might be alive.’

  ‘Then the bandsmen will pick him up,’ said Grainger. ‘Front and ride on.’

  He made himself do it, starkly aware of the emptiness on his right. Ryder said it didn’t matter who was beside him, but he’d never imagined it would be nobody. He groped at the memory of that precious conversation, the gift Ryder had left to him, and realized what in the end it had to mean. He must be that man, the one on the outside who steadied the others, the one who saved the army by standing still. He dug in his heels more firmly and looked ahead to the shining brown line of the Alma.

  Cardigan called ‘Halt!’ They were stopping again, hardly started and they’d stopped.

  ‘Is it that we can’t ford, do you think, Ol-Pol?’ said Bolton. The river was only a sluggish stream, but it lay in a deep ditch with steep banks more than the height of a man.

  ‘Must be a bridge somewhere,’ said Jordan. His jaw was moving furtively, and Oliver was sure he could smell liquorice. ‘Look, there’s one of ours already over.’

  The gleam of gold on a red saddlecloth caught Oliver’s eye. A single rider on a bay horse was trotting casually up the slopes wearing the cloak and cocked hat of the British Staff.

  ‘Doing the heroic,’ said Fisk with a sniff. ‘Trying to make it look easy.’

  ‘Doing the stupid,’ said Jordan. ‘Silly beggar’s all on his own. I bet he’s got lost.’

  Oliver didn’t care if he had or not. The fact was he was alone and Lucan and Cardigan were making no attempt to cross after him. They weren’t looking for a bridge, they were sitting scowling in their saddles, and it was clear that once again they’d been ordered to sit and do nothing.

  The Light Division were going in now, he could see the blur of redcoats dashing past to the river and the battle and glory on the other side. He heard the hammering of musketry and the first splashes as the bodies fell. He sat in his blue coat on his beautiful grey horse and wished the enemy would fire on them, wished they would fire on him as he stayed steady in the saddle, ready to guard the nakedness of the line.

  The ground was vibrating under his cheek. Ryder peeled open his eyelids against the crusted blood and strained to heave his head a couple of inches from the ground.

  The world in front made no sense. Smoke billowed over cratered grass, and curious brown blobs leaped in and out of vision, whirling round and round like dervishes at Meerut. One bounded straight past him, and Ryder recognized the long whorled ears and flash of white tummy as it tore by. Hares, lots of them, blundering over the field in fear of the guns.

  Guns. A howitzer shrieked overhead, and the crump shook the turf under his hand. Memory rushed back, and with it the realization he was pinned under a dead horse in the middle of a battlefield. Wanderer’s face was untouched by the shell that had exploded in his flank, peaceful and out of it, thank God, but Ryder wasn’t, and he thrust aside sentimentality to push at the carcase, wriggling his legs to haul himself free. His feet were tingling, his knees screeched in pain, but both were moving, nothing was broken. Wanderer’s front legs had buckled under him when he fell, taking the worst of the weight off his master beneath.

  It was still too much. If only he could get his chest free, dig in both elbows and really heave, but his free arm sunk weakly in the mud, his neck and shoulders tore from the strain, and impotence broke out in a sweat on his forehead.

  But new sounds were approaching, growing closer, and Ryder twisted his neck to see a mass of dark blue legs and black boots thumping towards him over the grass. The infantry assault line was advancing at last, but the neat ranks were bunched and broken as the overlapped Light and Second Divisions jostled to re-form, and what was tramping towards Ryder was no more than a mob.

  He supported his head on his elbow and tried to yell. Maybe someone would take a second in this chaos just to tug him free. He shouted again as the first men reached him, but his voice was lost in the blast of cannon, a careless boot kicked away his elbow, and his head thudded hard to the ground. Dazed and sick, he huddled back into the horse, frantically curling his arm round to shield his head, crying, ‘I’m not dead, for God’s sake!’

  ‘You look pretty dead to me, pal,’ said a voice, and a redcoat stooped in front of him. ‘You’re wearing half a horse on your phizog.’ A lumpy fist reached out to shove his hair back from his eyes, and Ryder was looking into a face he knew.

  ‘Thought so,’ said Bloomer, nodding in satisfaction. ‘Here, Morry, give us a hand with friend Ryder. Gone and got himself dressed up like Smithfield Market.’

  ‘Ah, but is he kosher?’ said the dark man gravely, kneeling and laying down his rifle. One thin hand circled Ryder’s wrist and the other slipped securely under his armpit. ‘Kick your legs if you can, friend, I’m not the stripling I was.’

  ‘That’s the ticket,’ said Bloomer. ‘I’ll lift the nag, you pull.’ More redcoats were jostling and pushing past, but he swept a gigantic muscled arm at them, said ‘Out the way, daisies!’ then pressed his shoulder to the horse and heaved.

  Ryder tensed for the pain, but his right foot kicked easily against the turf as the weight lifted, and he slid out as smoothly as a rod from a muzzle. His left foot throbbed abominably, his knees hurt to bend, and his ribs ached as he breathed, but with Bloomer and his friend supporting him he was able at least to stand. He straightened his crushed haversack and said, ‘Thanks. Thank you, I’m all right.’

  ‘Sez you,’ said Bloomer, cramming Ryder’s fallen shako back on his head. ‘Come on, Morry, best foot forward, we’re sucking hind tit.’

  Ryder staggered between them, and by the time they reached the first house of the village he was able to stand unaided to lean against its wall.

  ‘You’ll be all right here, pal,’ said Bloomer, watching the last Fusiliers disappear into the vineyards. ‘There’s muftis inside, journalists and the like, I seen them go in. Now if you’ll excuse us hopping off, me and Moses are owed a scrap.’

  Ryder tried to thank them, but Bloomer grinned through broken teeth, said ‘We’re square, that’s all,’ and loped away purposefully for the vineyard. Ryder saw that great-knuckled fist swinging by his side as he ran, and felt almost sorry for the Russians.

  He wished he’d a fight of his own to go to, but there was no sign of the cavalry ahead, even if he could have joined them without a horse. He wiped his face with his sleeve and stumbled
forward into the smoke-filled village.

  A hard central road ran all through. Buildings still burned to either side, but others were stone-built and seemed only blackened by the smoke. White-plastered house fronts were chipped by balls, and green-jacketed bodies of Riflemen lay dead by the roadside, but the Russian skirmishers had already retreated over the river, destroying the bridge behind them. Across the bank Ryder saw only the blossoming yellow muzzles of Russian guns.

  A shell smashed through a roof, and red tiles whizzed through the air to crash and ricochet off neighbouring walls. Something dark lurched screaming at his head, and he stumbled back into a doorway, but the object only brushed his shako and flapped harmlessly away. A bird, one of dozens reeling and swooping in the confusion of smoke. He turned for the open door behind him and staggered inside. Just a moment, that was all he needed, a moment to get his head clear and let the nausea and giddiness subside.

  It was dark and gloomy, an abandoned house, the promise of a moment’s peace. One dark corner seemed especially shadowy but his foot struck an obstacle before he reached it, a boot like his own, and he looked up into a pair of terrified and defiant eyes.

  ‘Shh,’ said the man, and a finger appeared in front of his lips. ‘Don’t want no one coming in, do we?’

  A noise behind made him turn sharply before he recognized it as the shallow panting of a man in distress. He saw him then, the hunched figure with its hands clawing its shins into its body, the corn-yellow hair flopping wretchedly over the wringing, tortured hands. A boy, no more, but with the red sleeves and deeper red cuffs of the 33rd Regiment of Foot.

  Ryder imagined what it must have been like, the terror of marching into the fire that burned away comrades either side, the seeming normality of houses, the open door like an invitation, a way back to the world lost. He cleared his throat and said, ‘You’ll feel better outside.’

  ‘What would you know?’ said the man in the corner, stepping aggressively forward. A 7th Fusilier, Bloomer’s regiment, but in a different league of men. ‘You wounded, are you, horseboy? It doesn’t bloody show.’

  Shame smacked Ryder in the face. He blundered to the door, and out into the smoke-filled air that seemed suddenly fresh in contrast. Across the road he saw surgeons bandaging men with torn and bleeding limbs, soldiers who’d gone down fighting with real wounds, not a cavalryman with bruises from falling off a horse. He’d done nothing in this war. He’d run from the Russians burning that village, he’d sat uselessly under fire at the Bulganek, and today he’d only watched men die. Bloomer had said he was owed a scrap, but so was Ryder, and by God he was going to have it.

  The pain and dizziness clarified into hardness, he threw them aside and ran. The bridge was no good, but on his left loomed the fence of a vineyard, the way Bloomer had gone. He hurtled over it and crashed through the rows of staked vines, downhill towards the river, the rifle shots and splashing, the thump-thump of cannon, officers screaming orders. He snatched a bunch of grapes from a laden vine and bit into them as he ran. Sharp popping of skins under his teeth, then the sweet coolness of the juice down his throat, clean and reviving as fresh, clean water. He spat out the stalks, took another bite and ran on, dodging round the green bundles of dead Riflemen in his path.

  Then there was colour ahead, redcoats swarming across the river, the last of the assault line crossing to the south bank. He slithered down the slope, and waded straight in. The bottom was slippery and the water cold in his groin, but he hefted his haversack higher and pushed on among the jostling crowd. Bullets whined and skipped over the surface and men dropped either side, pitching back to splash on their comrades behind. A red-coated body floated face-down in front of him, but he nudged it aside with his hip and waded on.

  The south side was teeming with their own men, but the bank was steep and fortified with fallen trees, jagged branches sticking out like spears into the faces of men struggling to climb. A sergeant of the 23rd Foot was straddling one of the trunks and leaning out a horny hand to help his stray lambs up the side. ‘Up you come, my boys, welcome to the devil’s playground.’ Rifles pinged at them, and as Ryder clawed his way up the bank a load of canister exploded only feet away, ripping a hail of iron fragments back into the faces of men emerging from the water. Ryder didn’t look back. He straightened on the bank and looked round for someone to fight.

  No one. The sharpshooters were on an overhanging ridge above them, the artillery entrenched on the heights, the battle was still to be joined. There was no sign of the cavalry, but around him were men fixing bayonets with grim glee on their faces and Ryder knew this was going to come to steel. He looked for an officer in the chaos, saw a young lieutenant of the 33rd and said breathlessly, ‘Permission to join?’

  The lad swung round, pistol in one hand, sword in the other, and a grin on his face like a boy at school. ‘Oh, come on anyhow, everyone else is!’

  He was right. Ryder wasn’t very familiar with the infantry units, but surely the 19th had started with Buller rather than General Codrington, while the 95th weren’t even Light Division at all. The 7th Fusiliers were panting off after their mad Colonel Yea, but everyone else was simply crowding behind Codrington, anyone who’d lead them against the bastards who’d blown their comrades to bits. ‘That’s me,’ thought Ryder. That’s me. His carbine was still under Wanderer, but he reached into his haversack and drew his father’s Colt. He was Ensign Standish again and it felt like coming home.

  A bugle sounded and they were off up the slopes, greenjackets followed by redcoats and one solitary bluecoat, all heading for the guns behind the earthworks of the biggest redoubt. Codrington led them, a distinctive figure on his Arab grey, gesturing stragglers to join them as he went. Their numbers were swelling, a great unruly mob tearing faster and faster up the hill, and when a thick column of Russians began to move silently down to meet them Ryder heard men around him actually cheer. ‘Hurrah, lads, here they come!’ cried an ensign. ‘Now we’ll give it them with sauce!’

  Ryder wasn’t aware of any orders, only the men forming a rough front in which he was quick to elbow a place. He capped his sixth chamber and fired with the rest. Another deep explosion of sound, but this one was theirs, the smoke came from their own guns and the men who fell were Russian. ‘That’s for Dick!’ yelled a man, and another ‘That’s for Sandy!’ A young private with tears on his face was reloading with fast and furious fingers, muttering ‘This is for you, you murdering bastards. This is for you.’ Ryder fired at the nearest mounted officer and thought simply ‘And that’s for me.’

  The grey lines rippled flame as Russian muskets returned fire. Ryder felt a thump on his shoulder as the man behind pitched suddenly forward, but only shrugged him away, scraped back the pistol cock and fired again. Again with the cock, the snug feel of a ratchet clicking home, point the thing and fire. The private next to him was already up again with his Minié, squeeze the trigger and fire. A stranger, a bony-faced lad with freckles and ginger hair, but as he turned for the reload the two of them shared a smile.

  And Ryder knew him. He knew all of them. These weren’t frightened recruits any more, they were veteran soldiers as much as himself. They’d lain under the Russian artillery and seen their friends die around them, they’d had the fear scorched out of them, and they were going all the way.

  The Russians saw it, knew it, and broke. A low moan shimmered through their lines as they split, ran, fell away to either side. Into the gap ran the British infantry, in it and up, and Ryder ran with them, wishing only for flatter ground that would be less strain on his foot and aching knee. He could see the summit now, the huge muzzles poking out of rough embrasures: ten, maybe a dozen great field guns, loaded and looking down on them, waiting only for their own infantry to clear before they flamed into life and fired.

  Burning iron carved into them, grapeshot exploded wildly in their ranks, but men who’d lain helpless under it for an hour and a half weren’t stopping for it now. Flying shrapnel, men dropping, sprays of blood a
nd bone and brains, these were the old things, nothing to stop for, all the more reason to get up there and take those damn guns. No one paused to fire now, it was in with the bayonet and bloody charge. Ryder drew his sword and ran with them. The grass was slippery with blood, the way blocked by fallen Russians, his foot was throbbing, his knee shooting pain up his thigh, but the men behind were pushing him on in this last desperate race for the top.

  Again the guns fired. At this range the balls simply drove into them, slicing bloody lanes through their ranks. Men were falling, arms flailing in front of him, bodies crashing against him, and for a moment there was only suffocating redness and death, but still the men behind pressed forward, surging upward, now, now before the cannon reloaded. Ryder gasped and ran, pitching forward on his hands, shove up against the grass and scramble on, hurtling forward to the guns of the big redoubt.

  Nearer and higher, and now familiar noises drifting down, the rattle of wheels and chains as the great muzzles slid backwards out of sight. ‘Stole away!’ men shouted. ‘Gone away! They’re taking the guns!’ Muskets still banged and cracked at them, but the balls were less than stones as their own lines stormed on. One was already there, a red patch streaking ahead to spring up on the earthworks, an ensign waving the colours of the Royal Welch Fusiliers. A boy, no more, he stabbed the staff into the earth and let the flag fly.

  The murmur round Ryder grew to a roar as men hurtled towards it, the Welsh to their colour, the rest to plant their own, all aimed like an arrowhead for that little scarlet square flapping lazily in the sky. The bark of a musket and the ensign fell, the standard fluttering down to cover him like a shroud, but another hand seized and thrust it upward, another voice cried ‘Come on the Welsh, come on, you bloody Englishmen, come on, come on, come on!’

  They came. It was a bloody flag, that was all, but his breath was sobbing with effort as he ran. Codrington was first, his horse springing over the earthworks with cavalry ease, but Ryder was in the next wave, over and at them, sword screeching into the lunge he’d needed for what felt like years, into the belly, twist in the guts under that grey coat, pull out and let the man fall. Blood ran warm down his arm, the smell of it sang. He looked for the next, saw gunners backing a cannon to limber, and leaped at the closest, hacking out with the edge, slice and back for the other, making the air whine with the swing. The man thrashed out with the heavy carriage chain, but Ryder twisted aside to drive the sword under it and home. His knee buckled under the violence of the movement, pain tore viciously up his leg, but still he pulled out ready for the next, bracing his weight against the parapet behind.