They rode round the head of the formation to Hasim Bey, and found a portly bearded man in a turban, watching, slumped in his saddle. Mamluk spearmen formed a line and kept Hazzard back. ‘My lord! Is this jihad? Do you call that holy? Do you think that honourable?’
Hasim did not understand. He gave a shrug and spoke, Nazir interpreting, ‘Hasim Bey says it is the death of our enemy, Hazar-effendi. He says surely this is why you are here.’
‘So that you might do murder to unarmed captives? If you do this you can expect no mercy from the French Sultan!’
The bey waved a hand as if Hazzard were an irritation. ‘We need no mercy from him. It is he who needs mercy from us. England shall observe.’
More cannons roared on the river and Hazzard’s mount whinnied and bucked. ‘England shall not bloody well observe!’ he snapped back. ‘Murderous bloody swine…’
Hasim Bey spoke and once more waved his hand. A platoon of spears surrounded Cook and Hazzard, forcing them to back away. ‘We cannot overcome the infidel in jihad if we have the infidel in our ranks,’ said Nazir pointedly, just as he had warned him in Cairo. ‘England shall observe.’
‘I’ll be damned if I’ll watch this—’
The Mamluk spears were thrust aggressively towards his mount. ‘Hazar-effendi,’ called Nazir urgently, ‘you must not force his hand. Already, he says, he is sullied by kafiri in his army.’
Hazzard looked out at the Nile, at the cooks, clerks, servants and savants battling the Mamluk flotilla. He could do nothing to stop it.
* * *
‘Mon dieu… barbares, les barbares…’ stammered the aged Berthollet, clutching at Monge’s shoulders. ‘Gaspard – they are monsters… evil, dark monsters…’
‘No, Claude,’ said Monge, ‘they are men. And it is we who attack them.’
‘I shall not be taken so – I shall not! My God, my God…’ Berthollet began gathering musket-balls and cannon-rounds, filling his pockets. ‘I shall drown, I shall sink, rather than—’
A cannon-burst knocked them sideways. ‘Get down!’ shouted Perrée, pushing Monge and Berthollet back with the others. Flames caught and their hired oarsmen ran from the bow. Sword drawn, General Andréossy screamed orders at the marines as they shot at the swimmers in the water. He saw Monge and called out, ‘Messieurs! Take shelter at once, if you please!’
‘Never mind us, General!’ cried Monge, then roared to the others, ‘Blankets! Sand! Hurry!’ and they charged forward. In their incongruous hats and coats the savant scholars beat back the flames, smothering the deck with buckets of sand and Nile water.
‘He must turn the squares to support us,’ insisted Bourrienne, gasping from exertion. ‘He must!’ He looked out to the field, at the endless swooping of the Mamluk cavalry, and the inexorable advance of the squares. ‘It is the least he can do, rather than leave us to take the brunt of the battle!’
Perrée agreed. ‘If he does not move towards us and distract the Mamluk artillery, it is hopeless.’
‘Claude! Come with me!’ shouted Monge. ‘We shall lay the guns!’
‘Gaspard, surely we—’
‘We once built them, so let us fire them!’
The oared galley on the west bank was blasted by the Mamluk flotilla, oars flying into splinters, the crew falling overboard, swimming away, crying for rescue. Another heavily laden Mamluk ship moved towards the second French gunboat and men began to leap aboard, some swinging across on lines, swords in hand. The screams shrilled into the air – frantically crowding the stern were Perrée’s unarmed passengers, in their coats and in their dresses, the grand spectacle transformed into nightmare as they glimpsed the slaughter awaiting them.
Andréossy ordered the French marines forward to the bows of the Cerf and they began firing volleys, clearing the decks of the Mamluk ships as Citizen Monge prepared to fire his cannons. Joseph Fourier ran to implore him. ‘Professor, mon dieu! Perrée has called the third boat for us! Come with me at once to the rear, je vous en prie!’
‘Not yet, Joseph! We shall damned well open fire!’
With a strength none of them had before witnessed, the old foundryman dragged the gun back from its place at the rail by himself and shoved in a packet charge. He shouted at the crewmen, ‘Load, damn you!’ and Monge took an 18-pound round as if it were no more than a tennis ball, and slammed it in. ‘Ram!’
Berthollet watched, his panic subsiding – until he saw Turks and Greeks swimming directly towards them. ‘Gaspard!’
A volley peppered the surface of the water from further forward, the waves dancing with shot, and the boarders sank into the Nile. One reached the rail but a marine thrust a spike bayonet into his eye and through his skull, ‘Ça va, salaud!’ – and put a boot to his face and shoved the body back over the side. Fourier fell to his knees and vomited, then staggered upright with the ram for Monge.
‘Now, Gaspard, come, for the love of God…’ called Fourier.
‘Wait, zut alors, Joseph!’
The crew ran out the loaded gun and Monge crouched behind it and kicked the barrel into position. ‘Ready!’
A second explosion rocked the boat. Berthollet tumbled to the deck, some of the junior savants rushing to his side, muskets in hand, but Monge did not take his eyes off the Mamluk ships. ‘Fire!’
The gunner puffed on his glowing linstock and put it to the touchhole. The cannon boomed. The ball smashed through the first Mamluk ship and took at least a dozen men with it. There was a cheer from the French boats across the river. They reloaded, and the Cerf began to bombard the enemy at last.
Perrée called through his loudhailer to abandon the two forward gunboats. The savants and clerks scrambled overboard at the stern, some falling into the water, some trying to jump to the deck of the third ship close behind, hands reaching out to catch them.
Sarah and Jeanne were nearly knocked down by the rush of those trying to get to the stern, a savant officer-cadet leading them. He snatched at Sarah as he passed. ‘Mademoiselle, please! To safety, I beg of you…!’
Sarah took hold of Jeanne and pushed her into his arms. ‘Jeanne! Get to the next boat! Go!’
‘You first! Vite!’ called Jeanne.
A party of Mamluks and Greeks charged into the troops on deck, French cavalrymen standing line abreast holding them back, their swords swinging – but some of the boarders had swum round behind and tried to clamber over the stern. A hand clutched at the rail beside Sarah and one of the soldiers’ wives screamed. Jeanne raged at him, ‘Non, vous salaud!’ and snatched up a fire-axe from the deck. She brought it down with all her strength, embedding it in the wood. There was a cry from the water and the man fell away leaving behind his bloody hand.
The savant-officer took his opportunity and lifted Jeanne bodily into the hands of another, and she was passed to the third gunboat calling, ‘Belle! Belle! Do not leave me!’
The crippled French ship listed abruptly and swerved towards the river’s edge, running aground in the mudflats and heeling over, occupants hurling themselves into the river to get off. Broken lines of French troops fought off the Mamluks as Sarah scrambled to jump over the side with the others but she stumbled, clawing at the rail. She saw a pistol and grabbed it up. A dark shape roared overhead and she pulled the trigger and the man crumpled and fell. Another young officer saw her, took her wrist, ‘Come with me!’ and pulled her through the debris of the deck.
A cannon round burst overhead, raining down clouds of splinters and timber. Without thinking, Sarah tore herself away and ran from him – and felt a heavy blow on her back. She flew forward, tumbling over the broken railing, falling head first into the Nile, slowly sinking into the current. She heard the savants calling behind her, and Jeanne’s voice, ‘Belle! Belle!’
* * *
Hazzard’s mount turned in frustrated circles, its breath snorting through its flared nostrils, eager to move, sensing Hazzard’s desperation.
‘This is the work of a diabolus!’ raged Hazzard to Nazir. ‘It does no honour to Allah o
r His Prophet! You cannot kill their soldiers but you can kill defenceless women and men of learning, like those of the Al-Azhar! Are you cowards?’
The Mamluks began to chatter angrily and shout up at him, thrusting their spears and pikes in their direction, Izzam and Alahum fending them off with their riding crops, shouting back at them. Nazir was horrified at his words. ‘Unbelievers must not speak the name of God so, Hazar-effendi! It is as saying Jehovah with disrespect and we shall all be put to death for your blasphemy!’
Hazzard would have none of it, and pointed madly at the scene on the river. ‘This is true blasphemy! An affront to His eyes, unholy, barbarous and savage! And we shall all rot in hellfire for it, damn you!’
A cry went up to their left and several scouts ran towards them, Bedouins and Mamluks dragging a pair of terrified Arabs through the sand. They dropped them at the feet of Hasim Bey’s horse. Izzam pulled closer to Hazzard. ‘Bedu,’ He tapped a finger at his chest, ‘Awlad ’Ali.’
Hasim Bey called out angrily to Hazzard, and Nazir said, ‘This boy says you know a Frenchwoman! Is this true?’
One of the two ragged Bedu was poor frightened and bloodied Yussuf, cowering on his knees, two Mamluks looming either side, one with a raised sword. He gibbered in fear, ‘Mes chou-choupettes, al-Aafrit al-ahmar, al-Aafrit al-ahmar,’ he repeated, raising his hands to cover his head, ‘Al-Pasha al-ahmar! Non non non…!’
Then Hazzard saw it, dangling from his wrist. It was his pendant of St Jude.
‘Where did you get that?’
Nazir looked at him. ‘What? You know this creature?’
‘Step back, damn you!’ shouted Hazzard to the Mamluks. He drew the deadly shamshir of Ali Qarim. ‘’Mshi! Yallah!’
Cook brought out two pistols and Hasim snapped a command. The Mamluks parted and the scouts retreated from Yussuf and his companion a pace, ‘Al-Pasha al-ahmar… al-Pasha al-ahmar—’
Hazzard threw back his binish robe to reveal his scarlet Bombay Marine coat beneath, its gold braid and jewelled Indian orders bright, and the Mamluks backed away at the sight of it. ‘I am the Red Devil! Ya al-Aafrit al-ahmar! Ayna!’ Where!
Yussuf collapsed on his face into the sand with relief, ‘Milord, milor’, I beg…’ he stuttered in English, holding up his open hands again, showing the pewter figurine. Hazzard stared in horrified comprehension.
Sarah. It could only be.
Hazzard felt his chest tighten, his breath coming in short gasps with a sudden rush of fear. He reached down and took the pendant. Lost on his fall from the Orient. It was his without question.
‘Where is she?’
Nazir was shocked. ‘You do know of the Frenchwoman?’
‘She is not French, Sharif! She is English—’
‘I do not understand, Hazar-effendi—’
‘An English agent, Sharif! Where is she, boy!’
Nazir turned and shouted down at Yussuf. ‘Ayna hia! Ayna!’
Yussuf pointed to the doomed ships on the Nile, the Mamluk flotilla bearing down upon them.
Hazzard looked.
My God.
He turned to Hasim Bey, enraged. ‘Stay then, great Bey al-kebir! But England shall not bloody well observe any longer!’ The Mamluk lord jerked back in his saddle with momentary fright, the Mamluks watching wide-eyed as Hazzard tugged at the reins and pulled his horse about, ‘Izzam! Alahum! Sergeant Cook, to me!’
‘Aye, sir!’
Hazzard’s mount leapt into the gallop, Izzam and Alahum after, Cook following. Hasim Bey watched them go with surprise, Nazir calling out ‘Hazar-effendi!’ but Hazzard would not have heard him.
Hazzard could hardly feel the ground beneath him as the Arabian tore across the sand and scrub towards the mudflats at full speed. Mamluk infantry cheered as he rode past them, his scarlet coat bright in the dun landscape, straggling groups of Bedouin raising their muskets, al-Pasha al-ahmar!
Guns on carriages, gun-crews rushing towards him then dodging away as he tugged the rein sharply towards the river. ‘Fire at the French squares!’ he called. ‘Turn! Turn your guns!’ he shouted vainly, then in rough Greek, ‘Gyriste ta kanonia sas!’ but still they did not understand and he tried to break through to the riverbank, men-at-arms and squires surrounding their elite warriors, Where! Where can I go! He pulled the reins back, the horse whinnying, men waving their swords, leaping aside, al-Aafrit al-ahmar! always something stopping him, something in his path, the horse finding a route, jumping a carriage, go on, boy, go on, Mamluks shouting jubilantly, al-Aafrit al ahmar!
His shemagh headdress flew open, flapping in the wind and he dragged it off, the heat beating on his skull like a hammer. He stood in the foot-irons and leaned forward, faster, the Arabian’s head plunging, its mane flying, its eyes rolling white as Hazzard charged into the shallows, the water spraying, then up onto the grassy banks again. All he could hear in his mind was the screaming, women’s screaming, Sarah’s screaming.
‘Hazar-effendi…!’
Izzam was shouting for him but Hazzard did not stop. Unable to keep up, Cook pulled in his reins, gasping, and bellowed at Alahum, ‘Get after him! Juldee, damn yer!’ and the Bedouin spurred his horse onward, following Izzam.
Hazzard raced along the riverbank, leaving the Mamluk forces behind, the river battle revealed in full. The Mamluk flagship rammed the French gunboat, shattered galleys drifting, wreckage floating, men on deck pointing, shots whining away behind as he rode. He saw the gunboat and the transports, the scrambling figures trying to get away.
Hazzard judged the distance and without knowing he had taken the decision guided the Arabian to a rise in the riverbank at full gallop. He loosed his feet from the stirrups, one knee on the pommel – Christ above – and leapt.
The horse stopped almost dead, and he flew in a sudden silence, turning, the sky spinning – then hit the water flat, his arms flailing, striking out beneath the surface, the robe and boots dragging, Ali Qarim’s scimitar bumping against his leg with every kick, the robe tangling and he shrugged at it, get it off get it off, his shoulder bursting with pain, and a bright light flashing, look, look for her.
He swam hard for the gunboat, put a heavy hand to the rail and hauled himself upward. A French soldier reached down for him and Hazzard called, ‘Capitaine St Juste, Batavien!’ It was a cry for help, that Hazzard was clearly no Mamluk, red coat, yes, but European, Dutch Batavian, better than nothing. He fell to the deck, a dead weight, the soldier calling to him, up get up, fell again, his knee giving way, weighing a ton, fire in his ribs, his back, then up again ‘Mademoiselle Isabelle—’
‘Who, m’sieur?’
‘The women! Where is the lady Isabelle Moreau-Lazare?’
A bullet whistled past, striking the planks nearby. A Mamluk rounded the ruins of the mainmast and the soldier yanked Hazzard to one side. ‘With me, Cap’taine!’
Three savants, two men and a woman running with a physician’s bag, collided with them in a panic heading for the stern. More Mamluks, Greeks, Macedonians, and the soldier was pulled off to a bayonet rank, killing two before falling back, Hazzard watching, winded, then looking aft.
‘Vite! Vite!’ the savants said, and Hazzard was knocked down from behind, Turk, and he drew the sword, fast, and swung the scimitar in a rough arc, the steel slicing through a knee without resistance, severing the leg in one clean cut, a scream, a dead weight, a flashing arm, up, get up.
A woman helped him to his feet. ‘Madame Lascelles, surgeon’s assistant,’ she said, and took his hand, pulling him up. ‘Go,’ he said to her, pushing them all to the stern, the saif blade not finished, flying in a loop to Hazzard’s right, a second boarder caught, shoulder, a bent-angled Thracian blade dropping to the deck, and again, and Hazzard whipped it down and across, a light Talwar, another scream, and the man fell.
M’sieur! A marine helped him propel the small group of civilians through the chaos of fallen rigging, tangled stays, broken spars and oars at all angles. They reached the wheelhouse and a raised aft
erdeck – it was then he saw a figure in black fire a small screw-barrelled pistol into the face of a boarding Mamluk. The man turned.
Hazzard stared. Jules-Yves Derrien lowered the pistol in disbelief.
‘You—’
The pistol came up fast and the flintlock clicked, empty, and Hazzard lunged but overbalanced, catching the edge of his wrist with the flat tip of the scimitar and Derrien cried out, dropping the gun as Hazzard crashed into him, dropping the sword. They grappled, arms locking, Hazzard kicking out for his legs and Derrien fell with a shout, trying to clutch at Hazzard’s knee but missing. Derrien’s scrabbling hands found Hazzard’s throat.
Hazzard grasped at his wrists and shouted in his face, ‘Get the civilians and savants off, you bloody fool!’
‘What are they to you!’
‘They don’t deserve to be butchered by the bloody Mamluks!’
A line of Turks and Levantines clambered through the wreckage of the superstructure, the first raising a half-moon battle-axe high over his head. Hazzard heaved Derrien to one side and burst from his grasp, finding the scimitar and swinging upward wildly, rolling and catching the Turk a blow on the hip, and another across the abdomen. The man retched, falling onto them both, Derrien striking at him with his own blade, missing, striking again.
A hail of small-bore cannon-rounds crashed into the midships shelter by the mainmast and exploded, more of the Mamluk mercenaries falling in the splinters. Derrien struggled upright and swung his sword down at Hazzard’s head, driving the filigree knuckle-bow guard at Hazzard’s temple. Hazzard ducked away but not enough; light burst behind his eyes and he fell back. Another blast of fire from behind and Derrien stumbled away, reaching the rail – and jumped overboard.
A man in black turban and leather jerkin charged Hazzard with an iron-studded mace – but stopped dead, his mouth open wide, as the mace and his severed hand fell to the deck, the tip of a scimitar bursting through his stomach. He crumpled, revealing Izzam behind, yanking his sword from the man’s back, ‘Hunehka! Mamliqiyyah! Ha!’ he grunted with satisfaction, flicking the blood from his sword in a spraying arc.
Lords of the Nile Page 22
