Chapter 8
Eight
A week had passed since Laurence’s arrival at Dover, and the first of September had given way to the eighth.
The mist of the earlier days had lifted, replaced by a brisk, clear wind off the Channel that carried the salt tang straight across the parade ground and into every fold of a man’s coat.
The regiment had settled into a steady rhythm: reveille at five, drill from six until noon, a short dinner, then more drill until four or five, according to the light.
The men moved with the ease of long habit; the new officers moved with the stiffness of those still learning where their place was to be.
Laurence Bennet had grown accustomed, in a grudging sort of way, to the ache in his shoulders and the blisters that had hardened into calluses on his palms. His boots, once objects of careful pride, were now scuffed and chalk-dusted; his scarlet coat bore faint white streaks where pipe clay had rubbed from the cross-belts.
He no longer arrived late, nor did he require repeated correction on the simplest commands.
Yet the work remained unremitting, and the wishful glory he had once pictured—so vivid in Hertfordshire drawing-rooms—had shrunk to the narrow compass of a chalk field and the voice of Colour-Sergeant Harris.
On this particular morning the company was practising the formation of square against cavalry.
The ground had been marked out with small flags; the men formed three sides of a hollow square, muskets at the ready, bayonets fixed, the fourth side left open for the supposed approach of horse.
Lieutenant Carter stood at the centre, calm as ever, directing the movements with quiet precision.
“Front rank—kneel! Second rank—present! Rear rank—load!” Carter’s voice carried without effort.
The square closed neatly. Laurence, posted with his platoon on the right face, felt the familiar tremor in his arms as he brought his musket to the present.
Beside him John Smith knelt without a word, ramrod already in hand; behind him Robert Evans loaded with the steady motions of a man who had done the same under French fire at Waterloo.
“Very good,” Carter said. “Recover—arms! Stand up. We shall do it again, faster this time.”
They repeated the manoeuvre four times. On the fifth, Harris stepped forward.
“Mr. Bennet,” he said, “your file is lagging. The square must close as one. If the horse breaks through at your corner, the whole is lost. Again.”
Laurence felt the sting of the words, though they were delivered without heat. He adjusted his stance, squared his shoulders, and when the command came, moved with the rest. This time the square formed cleanly; the men gave a low, satisfied grunt as the ranks locked into place.
Harris gave a single nod—high praise from him—and moved on.
At the midday break Laurence sat upon an upturned crate near the edge of the ground, bread in one hand, canteen in the other. Ensign Taylor joined him, wiping sweat from his brow with his sleeve.
“You managed the square better today,” Taylor said. “Harris noticed. He does not often nod.”
Laurence gave a short laugh, though it held little mirth. “A nod from Harris is worth more than a colonel’s compliment, I begin to think.”
Taylor grinned. “You are learning the language of the regiment. That is half the battle.”
They ate in companionable silence for a time. Across the ground, Lieutenant Carter spoke quietly with George Wilson, who was tending the company’s pack mule. The Yorkshireman laughed at something Carter said—a rare sound—and Laurence watched them with a curiosity he had not felt before.
“Do they all know one another so well?” he asked.
“Most of them have been together since the Peninsula,” Taylor replied. “Carter saved Captain Fielding’s life at Corunna—pulled him out from under a French lancer. The men remember. They trust him because of it.”
Laurence looked down at his bread. “And what must a man do to earn that trust?”
“Be steady when it matters,” Taylor said simply. “Not when the colonel is watching. When the other men are watching.”
The afternoon brought more skirmishing drill, this time in extended order across rougher ground near the cliffs.
The platoon advanced in loose files, taking cover where they could, loading and firing by platoons.
Laurence found himself moving almost without thought: drop to one knee, ram home the cartridge, prime, present, fire on the word.
The motions were becoming familiar, almost automatic.
Near the end of the exercise, as the bugle sounded the recall, Robert Evans stumbled on a loose stone and went down hard, twisting his ankle. Laurence was nearest; without thinking he stepped forward, caught the man under the arm, and helped him to his feet.
“Easy, Evans,” he said. “Can you bear weight?”
Evans grimaced but nodded. “I can hop, sir. ‘Tis nothing.”
Laurence supported him as far as the surgeon’s tent at the edge of the camp. The surgeon—a thin, irritable man named Mr. Poole—examined the ankle with brisk efficiency.
“Sprained, not broken,” he pronounced. “Rest it two days. No drill.”
Evans thanked Laurence with a quiet “Much obliged, sir,” before limping away to his billet.
Laurence Bennet stood a moment outside the tent, watching the man go. It was a small thing—any officer would have done the same—yet it felt different from the dozen small services he had performed at home without reflection. Here it mattered.
That evening he wrote again, this time to his father, though he knew the letter might not be read for some days.
My dear Father,
The regiment continues its work without pause.
I have begun to understand something of what is required—not the grand actions I once imagined, but the steady performance of duty in small things.
The men here have seen in battles more than I ever shall, yet they do not complain. I endeavour to follow their example.
I hope you are mending. Pray give my duty to Mother and my brothers.
Your affectionate son,
Laurence B.
He sealed the letter and laid it with the others he had not yet sent. Then he blew out the candle and lay listening to the wind and the sea.
For the first time in many weeks, the silence of his chamber did not feel like exile. It felt, almost, like the beginning of something else.
***
The tenth of September brought with it a clear sky and a steady westerly breeze, and with the breeze came orders that the six newest subalterns of the 43rd Regiment were to be conveyed aboard His Majesty’s ship Zealous, a seventy-four-gun ship of the line then riding at anchor in the Downs, for the purpose of exercising them in the use of small arms upon a moving deck.
The exercise, Captain Ellis informed them with his customary brevity, would teach them to keep their feet and their firelocks when the ground beneath them was no longer firm.
The men remained upon shore; only the young officers, Colour-Sergeant Harris to superintend, and a boat’s crew were required.
Laurence received the intelligence with a lift of the chin. “At last, something of a naval character,” he said to Ensign Taylor as they walked down to the quay. “I have always wished to see a line-of-battle ship at close quarters.”
Taylor, who had once crossed to Ireland in a packet, gave him a doubtful glance. “You may wish it less by noon, Mr. Bennet.”
The cutter lay waiting, its oarsmen already seated.
Colour-Sergeant Harris stood in the stern sheets, solid as a rock, his face betraying neither anticipation nor concern—the other four subalterns—Mr. Henry Finch, Mr. Edward Langley, Mr. Charles Merton, and Mr. George Hammond—clambered aboard with varying degrees of cheerfulness.
Finch was whistling; Langley looked mildly curious; Merton was already pale.
They pushed off at seven o’clock. For the first mile, the water remained kind, a long, gentle swell that lifted the boat and set it down again with the regularity of a cradle.
Laurence sat upon the after thwart, greatcoat folded beside him, one hand resting lightly upon his sword.
The white cliffs of Dover receded; the Zealous grew larger upon the horizon, her masts and yards stark against the sky.
“Fine morning for it,” Finch remarked, leaning forward. “I daresay we shall cut a gallant figure upon the quarter-deck.”
Harris made no reply. He was watching the young gentlemen with the quiet patience of a man who had seen many such parties set out in high spirits and return in a very different condition.
The swell increased as they cleared the lee of the land.
The boat began to pitch more sharply; spray flew over the bow in fine, cold droplets.
Laurence felt the first warning—a sudden queasiness, a coldness beneath the ribs.
He swallowed, fixed his eyes upon the Zealous’s stern lantern, and attempted to ignore the motion.
Taylor, beside him, gave a small groan. “Oh, Lord. It is beginning already.”
“Steady, Mr. Taylor,” Laurence said, though his own voice sounded strained even to his ears. “It cannot be worse than a hard day’s march.”
Merton, opposite, had turned a distinct shade of green. “I beg your pardon, gentlemen,” he muttered, and leaned suddenly over the side. The sound of his distress carried clearly above the creak of the oars.
Finch attempted a laugh that died in his throat. “Well. That is one way to lighten the boat.”
The cutter rose on a larger wave, hung suspended for a moment, and dropped with a sickening lurch.
Laurence’s stomach rose with it, then plunged.
Cold sweat broke out across his forehead and down his spine.
He gripped the gunwale until his knuckles whitened and stared fixedly at the horizon, but the horizon itself would not remain still; it rose, fell, tilted, danced.
“Eyes on the ship, Mr. Bennet,” Harris said quietly from the stern. “The horizon will deceive you. Fix upon something steady.”