The Ravishing of Lady Mary Ware (48 page)

The Emperor and his staff were about half-way to Borisov when ill-fortune again struck at Roger. While on the march, he now rarely left Mary's side, except to ride forward each afternoon to draw his miserable ration and to pick up from Rapp such news as had come in.

On this occasion the early winter darkness was already falling when he dropped back to rejoin Mary; but she was not riding as usual among the headquarters baggage wagons, so must have fallen out, for some reason. Suddenly the hush of the gently-falling snow was broken by the sound of distant shouting, followed by a shot. Spurring his horse into an amble, he rode a hundred yards in that direction then, through the drifting flakes, glimpsed
a number of men fighting. By then the units had become so mixed up that a cluster of Prussians were marching not far behind the headquarters wagons. A minute later he realised that Mary was among them, and the centre of the commotion.

Thrusting forward on his mount, he took in the scene. Three days earlier they had fed their horses the last of the oats he had managed to get hold of in Smolensk. Since then they had had only a few vegetables and some frozen thistles that he had found and cut for them. From lack of fodder, Mary's horse had become very weak. Although she led it for most of the time, it had now collapsed and lay dead in the road.

Like a flock of vultures, half a dozen Prussians had fallen upon it to get themselves a meal. Not content with that, they were pillaging the panniers of the priceless stores. Mary had evidently made a gallant attempt to stop them, and had shot one of the would-be robbers with her pistol. But another of the brutes had knocked her down.

Berserk with fury, Roger whipped out his sword, rowelled his horse and charged the group. Before they realised what was happening, his slashing blade struck one of the men from behind, slicing half through his neck, then its point pierced the breast of another. The remaining four, maddened with rage at the thought that they were about to be deprived of their feast, instantly attacked him.

Fortunately for Roger, the eagerness of all of them to grab as much as they could of the spoil before their companions got it had led to their throwing down their muskets; but, flinging themselves at Roger, they strove to drag him from his horse.

During the next few minutes it was touch and go whether he would succeed in driving them off or if they would pull him to the ground and kill him. He was able to keep in his saddle only because each of his legs had
been seized by men on either side of him, and neither was strong enough to tug him away from the other. In an attempt to free himself, he urged his horse forward by digging his knees into its flanks, but a third man had grabbed the animal's bridle. Instead of responding normally to the jab of Roger's knees, it reared, almost lifting off his feet the man who grasped its bridle.

The fourth man had picked up his musket and was raising it to shoot Roger. Swiftly he lunged over the shoulder of the man who was hauling on his left foot. The stroke took the would-be murderer in the mouth. His eyes bulged. His mouth, full of shattered teeth, gaped wide but, choked by his own blood, only a horrid gurgle came from it. Reeling back, he staggered a few steps and fell, a gush of his blood turning the snow beside his head crimson.

As Roger lunged, he yelled ‘
A moi! A moi
!', praying that some French soldiers would hear his cry for help and come to his rescue. But only Prussians—notorious for their excesses and the most brutal of all the troops forming the Grand Army—were within earshot. Most of them, their heads bowed, their ears muffled and their brains numbed by cold and misery, shuffled on. The few who heard him turned to stare for a moment and, no doubt feeling too weak to risk themselves in a fight, resumed their monotonous bid for life by forcing themselves to keep on putting one foot in front of the other.

Only seconds had elapsed after Roger had slain the man with the musket. With his left hand he pulled his pistol from his sash. Straightening his arm, he aimed at the man who was holding his horse's head. It flashed and there was a loud report. The Prussian's forehead was smashed in. The top of his skull lifted. Blood and brains spurted from it, his knees gave and he fell backwards in the snow.

Again Roger drove his knees with all his strength into
his charger. Freed from restraint, it now trotted forward, dragging with it Roger's two remaining assailants who were still clinging to his legs. Before it had covered twenty yards he had brought the barrel of his pistol cracking down on one man's head and the hilt of his sword on that of the other. As their grip gave and they fell away, he pulled hard on his mount's reins, so that the animal reared, turned and came down facing in the opposite direction. Within a minute he covered the short distance back to Mary. She was lying face down in the middle of the road near her dead horse.

His mind was in a whirl of agony. Was she dead or only injured? And, if injured, how badly? Would she be able to continue on their terrible march or, in a day or two, collapse and die by the roadside?

From the day she had attacked the
guarda
with her parasol outside the British Legation in Lisbon and enabled him to escape into it, he had known that she was a girl with courage; but, until they had made this ghastly trek together, he had not realised how steadfast and splendid that courage was. All through the exhausting days of alternate riding and foot-slogging in bitter winds or blinding blizzards, and nights when every limb ached and it was agony to expose hands or face to the blistering cold, she had shown extraordinary fortitude. Not once had she complained of the overwhelming weariness that everyone felt during the last hours of a day's march, or the pain of twisting stomach muscles that, at times, they had had to endure before giving in to the temptation to stave off their hunger with some of their reserve of special supplies. Only the fact that she had been in excellent health when they left Moscow, and the occasional titbits with which he had been able to supplement her miserable rations, could have kept so small and frail a body alive for weeks on end in the terrible rigours of a temperature that had sometimes fallen as low as twenty-five degrees below
zero. So he knew that her sufferings must have been worse than his; yet she had never faltered in her belief that he would bring her safely through their ghastly ordeal.

Her companionship on the seemingly endless days of tramping along the icy, snowbound roads, and during the frustrating halts when, somewhere ahead, a small bridge had broken down, or for some other reason they had had to stay stamping their feet and flogging themselves with their arms because the column had become snarled up, had been a constant tonic to him. Determinedly she had insisted on maintaining her role as his servant, cooked their scanty meals and, after Greuze had died, rubbed down his mount as well as her own. Time and again she had brightened the days by her cheerful chatter, not only for him and young Greuze, but also for the other officers-servants.

Then at nights they had been pressed body to body in their big sleeping bag. When they had not been too drained of energy to kiss and fondle each other, she had been sweetness itself. On other nights, when the sky was clear and the wind had dropped, side by side they had gazed up at the myriad of stars in the frosty sky, while they talked of things that had happened to them in the past.

These weeks of shared dangers and difficulties had brought about an intimacy between them that is often not achieved by couples who have been married for many years. He loved her little body and merry, piquant face, but he loved far more her sterling worth, her active, inquiring mind and her unfailing gaiety. The thought of losing her made tears start to his eyes. He could not bear it. He would rather have died himself.

The second he came up to her, he threw himself off his horse, thrust his arm through the bridle and knelt down, his eyes searching her face in terror that it would confirm his worst fears. One of the Prussians had hit her,
probably with the butt of a musket. There was a big bruise on her forehead above her left eye and, although she was unconscious, that eye was open, bulging and bleeding.

Round about were scattered in their blood the four Prussians he had killed, the one Mary had shot and the two whose skulls he had fractured. The rest had passed on. For about fifty yards the road was empty. Approaching on it was the remnant of a battalion of the Guard. Thrusting a hand under Mary's furs, he felt her heart and gave a great sigh of relief. It was still beating, and strongly.

As the officer leading the Guards came up, Roger called to him, ‘Be good enough to tell one of your men to hold my horse. I've trouble here that I can't handle by myself, but I'll not detain you long.'

With an eager eye on Mary's dead mount, the officer willingly obliged and halted his squad of men, while those of other companies tramped past them. Quickly Roger got out from one of his saddle-bags the small first-aid kit he carried in it. Again kneeling he swabbed Mary's injury with disinfectant lotion. The pain brought her to her senses and she began to moan fretfully. Covering her eye with a piece of wadding, he put a bandage round her head, then got out his flask of brandy and made her drink as much as he could get her to swallow.

Like ghosts the guards stood round, hollow-cheeked and sunken-eyed, watching him and already savouring in their minds the good supper they could make of the flesh of the dead horse; but Roger knew that they were still too well disciplined to attack him. The animal lay on its side, one pannier hidden beneath it, the other, exposed, had been nearly emptied by the Prussians. Having opened his furs so that the officer could see his A.D.C. sash, Roger said to him:

‘Tell some of your men to roll the horse over, then get those panniers across the withers of my charger. Is there
any chance of my wounded servant being given a lift in one of your wagons?'

The officer shook his head. ‘There's no hope of that, Colonel. We've had to abandon more than half of them already, and those that remain to us are now drawn by only two horses apiece. Even the weight of another sack of biscuits could prove too much for a pair of the poor beasts to draw for long. If we'd given lifts to one-tenth of the wounded we've passed, all our supplies would have had to be left with them scores of miles back, and the lot of us would have died of starvation by now.'

It was the reply Roger had expected. With a shrug he said, ‘I'm fond of the lad and would like to save him. We'll get him up on to the saddle of my charger, and secure him there. Your men can then set about flaying the carcass.'

Without waiting for an order from their officer, the listening men readily freed the panniers and lifted them on to Roger's horse. Into the nearly empty one he stuffed the fur sleeping bag. Then, having hoisted Mary, who had again become unconscious, on to the saddle, they tied a cord that was attached to both her ankles under the horse's belly and another, tied to her wrists, under its neck; so that she could not fall off. Immediately the men had done as Roger asked, slobbering ravenously they attacked the dead horse with bayonets and hands, tearing strips of meat off the back, haunches and belly until, within a few minutes, it was reduced to a bloody skeleton.

Roger had already taken the reins of his charger and joined the ragged stream of men who were blindly trudging forward. Darkness had now fallen. Many of the marchers were lighting little fires at the roadside to cook bits of horsemeat they had managed to get hold of during the past few days; others, who had nothing to cook, were still doggedly tramping on, in the hope that they would reach some village that had not yet been stripped
as clean as an empty iron cauldron of everything edible.

That, too, was Roger's hope. From time to time he glanced back to make sure that Mary was still securely in the saddle, and saw how her bandaged head swayed from side to side with the horse's motion, her face brushing its mane. The jerking movement must, he knew, be very bad for a head wound; but he dared not stop until he reached some place where she would be under shelter and he could tend her.

When he had walked for something over a mile, not far off the road he saw a ruined farmstead. Light coming through gaps in the shattered wooden walls showed that it was occupied. Every night any such protection from the cutting wind was always eagerly seized upon and, at times, groups of soldiers of different nations fought for such meagre shelter. He thought it certain that he would find the place crowded to suffocation, but left the road to investigate.

As he approached, he was challenged by a sentry. In reply he called out, ‘I have a wounded man here. I pray you, in God's name, let me take him inside.'

‘No room,' the man called back gruffly. ‘Be on your way, soldier.'

‘I beg you, think again,' Roger pleaded. ‘I've tea and sugar with me, so can pay for my lodging.'

At that the man told him to wait a minute, then went into the house and returned with another man who proved to be a young French Lieutenant. After a brief conversation he agreed to let Roger join the eight men who were all that were left of his platoon. Between them they untied Mary and the Lieutenant and the sentry carried her inside. Roger remained with his horse. It was irreplaceable and, without it, he knew that he would never be able to get Mary out of Russia; so it was essential to give it all the care that was possible.

The moon was coming up and the light reflected from
the snow made it almost as light as day. Leading the horse round to the back of the farmhouse, he saw that the stabling had been burned down; but he found a large woodshed that still had about a third of its roof left. He was naturally loath to leave his mount, in case it was stolen in the night; but it was still uncertain whether Mary would live or die, so the first consideration was to be with her.

When he had tied up the horse, he gave it a drink from a bottle containing melted snow that he kept hung from his saddle, then he fished about in the still-full pannier until he came upon a canvas bag nearly full of crushed army biscuits, upon which he had fed the horses when no fodder or cereal were available. In two journeys, he then carried his saddle-bags, the panniers and the big sleeping bag into the only room in the house which still had a roof.