By My Sword Alone David Black (best story books to read txt) 📖

they were wheeling south across low rolling fields beneath a still hot, early autumn sun.

The fields had been surprisingly empty. No peasants working them, no livestock grazing, the roads, or rather packed-dirt tracks, had been deserted. The land knew something was coming.

He had breasted the rise first, his men ranged out behind him in two long, skinny lines, one squadron up, one back. Three hundred dragoons in their dark blue uniforms all faced in red, walking forward at a steady pace, covering the ground, looking for a Russian army.

And now, here they were, the Russians, spread out in a carpet of mostly green and white – the foot soldiers – that seemed to ripple through its own cloud of dust as it marched across his front. The Polish nobles at the electoral sejm who’d favoured the Russian candidate had said 20,000 were coming. James, looking down the gentle slope towards this host, could not gainsay them. He had never seen such a press of men, or one that stretched so far – further than he could make out.

His chest tightened, and his mouth shrivelled to dryness. Beart, the Frenchman who commanded one of his squadrons, came up beside him, regarded the sight and then turned to order the two lines to halt.

Beart, who could give classes in sangfroid, made no spurious comment regarding the magnificent tableau they had just stumbled upon. His only words were, after a long moment, ‘Your orders, excellency?’

James thought: My orders? The only sensible order he could think of right then was, run! The thought that he might actually give it, made him laugh to himself. That he did so would become regiment lore after this day was over, and attach about his reputation like a mantle. ‘And what did Colonel Lindsay do, when he first saw the Russians? Why, he laughed!’

James’ eyes drank in the terrain. And in his sweep, he saw the more colourful bodies of cavalry, guarding the flanks of the Russian column of march. One unit, in sky-blue tunics and breeches, and black-fur edged pelisses, detached itself and began to deploy into its component troops. His presence had been noted.

Hussars, he guessed; even at almost 2,000 paces he could tell from those short jackets, worn over the shoulder. Light cavalry. Most of them were forming into line to face up the rise towards him, but at the back, there was at least a troop that was not.

James’ horse was on top of a crescent hill that curved shallow to his right, but a few hundred paces to his left, the curve was sharper. The detached hussar troops were galloping that way, while the bulk of them, now deployed in line, were walking up the rise directly towards James, as they would if they were coming to chat. He took it all in, and knew immediately what the enemy were intending, the moves revealing themselves just as if he were looking down on a chessboard and James Francis Edward was manoeuvring him into another drubbing.

He reached down into his sabretache and withdrew his notepaper and pencils, then he scribbled his orders. No dictation for Colonel Lindsay, no misunderstandings left to chance. He tore off the written sheets and handed them to a teenage cornet with a curt, ‘Rapidement!’

Much had happened since James had ridden into Warsaw mere weeks before. For a start, he had assumed command of his promised regiment, with a proud local name, the Dzików, or Wild Boars – or, if you were Beart, Les Sangliers. Some 750 dragoons, or mounted infantry, they formed the only cavalry among the mere 2,000 regular Polish soldiers in the city.

Then he had been introduced to the Polish aristocracy, but as a welcome ally, nothing more. The French minister to Poland, le Marquis de Monti, had told him not to take offence. ‘Be grateful they do not want to be friends,’ he had assured him. ‘They are an acquired taste, hard to assimilate en masse.’

For they were all gathered there, the entire Polish nobility, in the city of Warsaw. For the sejm, so great was the fever among them at the prospect of a fight for the succession.

There were endless receptions in the city. Morning and afternoon receptions, evening receptions that went on until dawn. There were frequent duels. And all the while, James had been left on the fringes, or in the ante-chambers, twiddling his thumbs, waiting for he knew not what.

He’d used part of the time to sell off the indifferent nags that had carried him here, and to set off to find a mount more suited to his tastes. He found her in another chestnut filly that he named Estelle; a calm, settled, elegant beast who had responded with grace to his whispers and his apples.

If he’d remained committed to his duties to keep in communication, he’d have found himself seriously stuck for anything to write about to Paris, or Rome, on which way sentiments were swinging. The only thing that was obvious was the rabble wanted Stanislas. You only had to listen at the windows to hear. But from the halls where the debates among the nobles took place – and there were many – there was only dispute, and the odd sound of swordplay, with more wounded bodies emerging than clarity.

It was while he languished in this wilderness that the Gräfin Dorothea von Kettler appeared. Hers was the name de Valençay had handed him in his scribbled note.

Looking back from his vantage on the hill, James watched as the first line of his dragoons dismounted and marched up to form a line, a little over 300 paces behind him, below the hill’s brow. The second line closed up into troops, and cantered off to his left, staying hidden behind the contours of the rise. Beart stole a look at his commanding officer, and was relieved by the satisfied jut of James’ chin.