‘The English have certainly not made the best of the time they have been given since you last contemplated a descent on their shores, but they are now definitely in a position to give us a hotter reception. In ’96, apart from such great castles as Dover, Walmer and so on they had virtually no fixed coast defences, whereas they have since built a chain of forts along the Kent and Sussex beaches. There is one every few miles and they call them Martello Towers.’
‘That I had heard. What are they like? Are they armed with cannon? Do you consider them formidable?’
‘They are round, with inward-sloping walls and thirty or forty feet in height. Some have cannon on their roofs, the others are expected to receive their armament shortly.’ In the latter statement Roger lied, as he knew the deliveries from the arsenal to be hopelessly behindhand. He continued, ‘To storm them will not be easy, as they will be defended by resolute men.’
Bonaparte smiled. ‘To have built them with inward-sloping walls was folly. That makes it less easy for a garrison to thrust the top of a scaling ladder back and cast it down with the men upon it.’ Looking across at Bourrienne, he added, ‘But we shall need many scaling ladders. Make a note to treble the quantity normally allotted to each Division.’ To Roger he said:
‘You consider the morale of the British to be good?’
‘About that I have no doubts. In every past campaign they have displayed their doggedness in defence. And you may be certain that in defending their own soil they will fight like tigers. You may recall, mon Général, that when you asked my view on this two years ago I told you that not only will the troops show great bravery but people of all ages for miles round will come to their aid with shotguns and pitchforks, and I have seen no reason to change my opinion.’
‘Unorthodox resistance of that kind will be only temporary,’ Bonaparte shrugged. ‘After I have had a few hundred of them shot as francs tireurs the others will be glad enough to run back and tend their pigs. But what of Regular forces? Have these been materially increased?’
‘Not greatly,’ Roger admitted, ‘but to some extent. However, they will now have the support of a considerable Militia. Virtually every able-bodied gentleman and yeoman within twenty miles of the coast has been embodied in these volunteer units, given a uniform and equipped with weapons.’
‘Pah!’ exclaimed the General. ‘My veterans will make mincemeat of such amateurs. And you say that the Regular forces have not been much increased? Well, God is always on the side of the big battalions. Once ashore we shall drive all before us.’
Lannes suddenly put in, ‘But we have first to get ashore. And in its present state our Navy is no match for that of the English.’
‘What of that?’ Bonaparte replied promptly. ‘Looked at on a map, the Channel appears to be no more than a gulf between the two countries; but in fact it consists of hundreds of square miles of water. The English Fleet cannot be everywhere at once and it should take us only about seven or eight hours to get across. If we make our crossing on a foggy night the chances of running into their Fleet will be negligible.’
‘We might run into one of its frigates,’ argued Lannes. ‘If so, the frigate would bring the Fleet speedily down on us, to our destruction.’
Bonaparte gave him an impatient glance. ‘Should that happen our own escorting ships-of-war would swiftly overwhelm the frigate. Even did she escape, the odds are that it would be many hours before, in fog, she could locate the Fleet and bring it down upon us. By then we should be safely ashore and with our artillery landed.’
‘Would not fog prove as great a handicap to us as to the enemy?’ Roger asked. ‘Surely our flotillas would be liable to become dispersed. Many units would then find themselves lost and fail to reach their objectives.’
‘I should take precautions against that. Each ship or barge would carry a fog-horn and keep in touch with her companions by sounding recognition signals at short intervals.’
Bonaparte’s only experiences of sea travel were his brief crossings between Corsica and France, whereas Roger had voyaged many thousand miles. Moreover, he had learned much during his boyhood of the storms and currents of the Channel, so he did not think it at all likely that this idea could be made to work in practice. But he refrained from voicing his opinion.
After a moment Bonaparte asked, ‘Do you know who has been nominated to oppose me when I land in England with an Army?’
Roger smiled. ‘Alas, no! I was neither in the confidence of Downing Street nor the Horse Guards. I think it almost certain, though, that the Duke of York would assume command in person.’
‘What! That barber’s block whom Pichegru chased out of Holland in ’95?’
‘Since he is the King’s son and Commander-in-Chief of the Army, it is hardly likely that he would allow himself to be passed over.’
‘Then I will eat him for breakfast.’
After the laughter had died down Roger remarked, ‘He could, of course, have a Second-in-Command well qualified to advise him. Faced with such a desperate situation, they would probably recall Sir Ralph Abercrombie from Ireland.’
‘He did well in the West Indies,’ Bonaparte admitted. ‘But he is an old man now. He must be well over sixty and, I am told, near blind; so he will give me little trouble.’
The conqueror of Italy would have spoken less disparagingly of Sir Ralph could he have foreseen that three years later the Army he had left to garrison Egypt was to be totally destroyed by this veteran.
‘It is possible,’ Roger suggested, ‘that Lord Cornwallis might be given the post, or even the Command. He has a great reputation———’
‘Reputation!’ Bonaparte snorted. ‘That fellow! Why, he lost the war in America for the British! He allowed himself to be boxed up in York Town by a mob of colonial farmers and was compelled to surrender. He is, too, nearly as old as Sir Abercrombie.’
‘I think you underrate him. In America it was not his strategy that was at fault but the Navy’s failure to break the blockade and bring him reinforcements and supplies. Later, in India, he did extremely well in the wars against the native Princes.’
‘Oh, India! What chance could any horde of natives, armed with spears and javelins, stand against well-trained European troops equipped with modern artillery?’ Bonaparte’s eyes suddenly lit up. ‘One day I will go to India and throw the English out. That done, within half a year I could make myself master of the whole sub-continent, from the Himalayas to Ceylon.’
Roger smiled. ‘I have no doubt of that, mon Général. I agree too that, as was proved in Italy, Commanders of over sixty could have little hope when confronted with your new, swift and audacious methods of waging war. But, from what I have heard, the English now have a number of younger officers who show considerable promise. I became quite intimate with one such when I was in India. His name was Arthur Wellesley. Although only a Colonel, they thought so highly of him that he was given the Command last spring of an expedition to Manila and charged with ousting the Dutch from their East Indian possessions.’
‘I had intelligence of that. But you raise a matter that will prove of immense advantage to us in our invasion. The commitments of the British in India and the West Indies compel them to keep all their best regiments and officers abroad, and in the latter theatre thousands of them are carried off each year by yellow fever. That leaves the island but poorly defended and by an Army of the old type similar to that of France before the Revolution. Young men of noble families buy their commissions in it, but are soldiers only in so far as the fine uniforms they wear. Often, for years at a stretch, I am told, they are allowed to be absent from their regiments; so they know nothing of the art of war.’
‘Besides,’ put in Bourrienne, ‘this officer of whom Breuc speaks is only a Colonel; so even if recalled he could not hope for the Command of more than a Brigade.’
‘True, true. But Breuc is right in his contention that they have certain officers on the way up who show promise. There was one who greatly distinguished himself at
the taking of Calvi, when the English invaded Corsica. He was a Colonel John Moore, and he showed not only great dash and courage but also intelligence. Later, when the island was subdued, he was made Adjutant-General to the forces there. He then took considerable pains to become acquainted with the leading Corsican families and showed them much kindness, thereby lessening the hostility to the English garrison stationed in the island.’
Roger nodded. ‘I recall hearing of that, because on learning that Colonel Moore had been fraternising with the patriots the Viceroy, Sir Gilbert Elliot, became furious, and ordered him to leave the island within forty-eight hours. The Viceroy’s action was much criticised; so it had no harmful effect on Moore’s career. Shortly afterwards he was promoted to Brigadier and sent out to the West Indies, where he became Sir Ralph Abercrombie’s right-hand man and again distinguished himself in numerous hot actions.’
‘Where is he now?’ asked Bonaparte.
‘I have no idea. I heard no mention of him during my recent stay in England.’
‘No matter.’ The General-in-Chief abruptly stood up. ‘Write a full report of all you saw and heard while there and give it to Bourrienne. You will, of course, accompany me when I leave in the morning.’ Turning to Réveillon, he added, ‘I shall now get some sleep.’ Then, without excusing himself further, he nodded absently in reply to a chorus of ‘Good nights’ and walked quickly from the room.
Réveillon led the others back into the salon and a number of them crowded round Roger, pressing him for further particulars of the desperate time he had been through. But it was now getting on for seventeen hours since Tardieu had roused him to face one of the most gruelling days he had ever spent. Reaction had set in and only Bonaparte’s electric presence at the supper had enabled Roger to keep going through the meal; so he begged to be released and went up to bed.
Next morning he was roused at four o’clock and by five they were on their way. It was typical of Bonaparte’s furious urge to get anything he undertook completed swiftly that he would not allow his progress to be slowed down by the bad state of the roads. He travelled in a big carriage that had reinforced springs and was drawn by six strong horses. Two pairs of extra horses accompanied it, so that the team could be increased to ten when going up steep hills, and it was escorted by a Squadron of Hussars who were always on hand to hoist it out of ruts should it get stuck. As the weather continued fine, their progress was not impeded by deep mud or landslides.
Lannes, Bourrienne and the Polish aide-de-camp Sulkowsky travelled in the carriage with the General. Roger rode alongside it on a horse that had been provided for him and was thankful to escape the constant jolting of the vehicle, which must have been very wearing to its occupants. At first he wondered why they, too, did not ride; until he realised that Bonaparte, who never wasted a moment, was employing his time by dictating notes to Bourrienne about the state of the coast and that, despite the bumping, that hard-worked official was somehow managing to take them down.
Their first stop was Dunkirk, and there Roger asked Bourrienne for some of the back pay due to him. The Chef de Cabinet unlocked a brass-bound chest in the boot and gave him a small bag of gold coin together with a great bundle of assignats. The latter were paper money issued by the Government some years previously on the security of the lands confiscated from the Church and nobility. In exchange for gold they had since dropped to a fraction of their face value, but shopkeepers were still compelled by law to accept them. Dividing the bundle into three, Roger arranged for them to be sent to the young Major at General Desmarets’s headquarters with the request that they be passed on to the soldier whose fingers he had cut off with the spade and the two Coastguards whom he had injured, as some compensation for the wounds they had sustained while only doing their duty.
Bonaparte had sent Sulkowsky to the harbour-master with an order that he should collect any Captains of ships, fishermen and smugglers whom he could readily find and bring them to the local military headquarters. As soon as these worthies arrived the General fired a series of questions at them about the capacity of the wharves, the amount of shipping of all kinds based on Dunkirk, the effect of offshore currents and so on. He then carried out a personal inspection of the port. Roger, meanwhile, took the opportunity to buy himself a hat and topcoat, also a razor, change of linen and a few other things.
Lannes had already been sent ahead to ride along the beach to Furnes, where they picked him up in mid-morning. They then drove on to Nieuport and, after Bonaparte had carried out a brief inspection, snatched a hurried meal there. By four o’clock they reached Ostend and in this larger port the procedure at Dunkirk in the morning was repeated.
For some years past the Belgian Netherlands had been absorbed into the French Republic; so they spent that night at the residence of the Military Commandant. But during the evening Roger managed to get a little time in which to carry out a highly private matter of his own.
Having secured pen, ink and paper, he took them with him when he went up to the bedroom he had been given to wash in before supper. On two of the sheets of paper he scrawled a semi-literature letter in French. Anyone reading it would have accepted it as a communication from some small distributor of smuggled goods to his opposite number in England. The greater part of it concerned current prices for French cognac and scent and for Brussels lace, and asked for large consignments of English cloth. But near the end he inserted a paragraph that read as follows:
I hear that great quantities of jelly-fish are breeding on the French coast. The spring tides will, people say, carry them to England. You owning fishing smacks should warn your fellows of this, else they’ll do great damage to the nets. Big shoals of them can likely be spotted in daylight, but not so at night, and especially in foggy weather.
He addressed an envelope for the letter to Mr. George Peabody at the Crown Inn, Dover. Then he put it in another envelope addressed to Citizen Oammaerts, Patron de l’Auberge du Bon Voyage. He had to wait until after supper before he could slip away, but down by the docks he soon found a man who could direct him to the inn. It was one of the secret post-offices that had been established in all the principal ports along the French coast to enable English agents to have their reports smuggled over. Roger had never previously made use of this one but it was a part of his business to memorise them all.
As he was not yet in uniform he could go into the inn without fear of arousing unwelcome comment in connection with his clandestine business. Even so, he took advantage of the prevailing fashion to arrange his voluminous cravat so that it should hide the lower part of his face.
He would, if necessary, have left his letter with a postman but, having called for a drink, he felt very much happier on learning that the little, wizened-faced man behind the bar, with gold rings in his ears, was Citizen Cammaerts. After knocking back the tot of brandy he had ordered, he slipped the letter and a louis across to the landlord, who took them both, ripped open the outer envelope, glanced at the inner one and slipped it into his pocket with a nod but no word.
Roger had put a special mark on the envelope, so that when Mr. Peabody received it he would pay the bearer five guineas then without delay forward the letter to an address in Queen Anne’s Gate. Mr. Pitt and Lord Grenville at the Foreign Office would receive copies of it very shortly afterwards and, from the paragraph about the jelly-fish, they would have no difficulty in deducing that a French invasion could be expected on a foggy night before the spring was out.
When Roger got back to the Commandant’s house Bourrienne asked him where he had been, but he shrugged the question off by replying that he had drunk so much wine at supper that he had felt he must get a breath of fresh air. Then, very pleased at having got this urgent information safely away, he went up to bed.
Next day they drove further up the coast and crossed to the island of Walcheren. After Bonaparte had assessed its possibilities as an invasion base, they went on to Antwerp. There they had another quick midday meal, after which Bonaparte questioned a nu
mber of people and inspected the port. By nightfall they arrived in Brussels and early on the 16th set out on the long drive to Paris.
It had been a whirlwind tour. Bonaparte had left Paris on the 10th, so in seven days he had covered well over five hundred miles. He alone among the party appeared unaffected by the strain. Even tough little Lannes was showing it, but when they drew up in the newly named Rue de la Victoire the pale-faced, frail-looking Corsican told the unfortunate Bourrienne to come into the house with him so that they could look through such correspondence as had arrived in his absence.
Roger took his leave and jogged on wearily to La Belle Etoile, almost falling from his saddle outside the inn. By then it was past midnight so the place was in darkness, but persistent knocking brought the landlord, Maitre Blanchard, down to the door. He was swathed in a woollen robe and still wearing his cotton nightcap.
The worthy Norman believed Roger to be a Frenchman, but had known him to be an aristocrat and secretly a Royalist during those desperate times when he had passed himself off as a fervid revolutionary. But he had always kept Roger’s secret, proved the staunchest of friends and still had up in his attic a big trunk of clothes, varying from the tattered garments of a sans-culotte to the elegant attire of a young exquisite, that Roger had used as occasion required during the long periods in which he had made La Belle Etoile his home.
On recognising Roger, Maitre Blanchard welcomed him with delight, roused a serving boy from a cubby-hole under the stairs to take his horse, and led him in. Seeing his exhausted state, he tactfully refrained from asking what had become of him during the past two years, and took him up to a comfortable bedroom. There he pressed Roger to let him bring him up a grog or hot posset, but Roger declared that he would sleep like a log without any aid to somnolence.
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