The Spanish Bride

4

When Sir Rowland Hill’s force arrived in Madrid, George Simmons saw his brother Maud again, a doubtful pleasure, since Maud, an improvident young gentleman, was a great trial to his elder brother. Poor George had been obliged to slide away from his merrymaking friends, for he had received very distressing tidings from Joe, still sick in Salamanca, and had sent him his last gold piece stuck under the seal of his letter. Very unfortunately, he had been sitting for his likeness, which he had had taken for his sister Ann, so that he found himself, after sending off the gold coin to Joe, all to pieces.

Others were in much the same predicament, but by hook or by crook most men contrived, by the sale of still more of their belongings, to keep their pockets sufficiently lined to enable them at least to amuse themselves on the Prado each evening.

The divisions left to guard Madrid remained there until the end of October. The news that came from the north was not good, and it soon became apparent that Lord Wellington was not going to return with the rest of the army to Madrid after all. A whisper of retreat began to circulate through the ranks. His lordship, besieging Burgos with an insufficient battering-train, was making no headway; and, meanwhile, the forces of King Joseph, Suchet, and Soult had effected a junction, and were marching on the capital. The autumn rains, which Wellington had counted upon to make the passage of the Tagus an awkward business, were late in falling upon New Castile; the Tagus, General Hill thought, was still perfectly practicable. There was a good deal of coming and going between his headquarters and Wellington’s throughout October, and on the 23rd of the month, the Light division received unexpected orders to be at the alarm-posts at six o’clock in the evening. ‘Where’s Harry? Where are we off to? What’s the meaning of it?’ asked more than one of Harry’s friends, finding time to call at his quarters.

Juana only knew that the brigade was being moved to Alcala de Henares, north-east of Madrid. George Simmons said that Alcala was the birthplace of Cervantes, but Jack Molloy, who had made arrangements to attend a ball at the Calle de Banos, said that that made it no better.

Nobody wanted to leave the immediate neighbourhood of Madrid, but it was thought, on arrival there, that Alcala was a very good sort of a town, very clean, and with an air of antiquity lacking in the capital. But why the division had been moved few people knew. The truth was that Hill was in an uncomfortable position, with the army of King Joseph closing in on Madrid, the Tagus perfectly fordable, and General Ballasteros, who should have joined forces with him, nowhere to be seen. In point of fact, Ballasteros, instead of keeping Soult occupied, had got himself arrested by the Cortes, at Granada, as the result of seizing the moment of Wellington’s being made Generalissimo of the Spanish Armies, to publish a manifesto, violently objecting to the appointment; and to attempt a coup d’etat with the purpose of making himself supreme ruler of Spain.

The brigade spent four days in Alcala. On the 27th October, just, complained Kincaid, as everyone was beginning to feel at home, orders came for the division to move towards the right, to Arganda.

‘Here we go round the mulberry bush!’ said Jack Molloy. ‘We shall find ourselves back at Getafe before we know where we are.’

‘Don’t raise your hopes too high,’ recommended Captain Leach. ‘This looks to me like forming a battle-front. Well, I’m glad old Daddy Hill means to make a push to defend Madrid.’

The division marched south, crossing the Henares, and reaching Arganda at dusk. Arganda was found to be quite a small place, but no one cared a penny for that, since it was famous for the excellence of its wines. Upon being told to fall out, the men made haste to put the reputation of the town to the test; and Vandeleur, who was in temporary command of the whole division, General Allen’s headquarters still being fixed at Alcala, procured several bottles of something very special, and proceeded to make a night of it. By ten o’clock, the division had reached a state of brief, riotous happiness. An orderly arrived at the Smith’s quarters with an urgent message from Vandeleur for Harry to go at once to headquarters; and Harry, who had been sitting before a snug fire, with Juana on his knee, cursed, and said ‘What in thunder does the old man want now, I wonder?’ He went off to the house he had taken for the General. Vandeleur was seated at a table with an impressive array of dead men before him. When Harry walked in, he hailed him in a loud, cheerful voice. ‘Hello, is that you, Harry? That’s right! Go and order the assembly to sound, my boy.’

‘Order the assembly to sound?’ gasped Harry. ‘What, now, sir?’

“That’s what I said, isn’t it? Just heard from Alten. Whole division’s got to countermarch on Alcala.’ He waved a hand in a lordly fashion. ‘Sound the assembly!’ ‘But, good God, sir, we can’t march now The men are all top-heavy!’ expostulated Harry. ‘Drunken sots!’ said Vandeleur, with a magnificent disregard for his own condition. Harry glanced at the ADC, but that gentleman was smiling vacantly at nothing in particular, so that it was plain there was no help to be got from him. Harry turned his attention to Vandeleur again, saying persuasively: ‘Listen, General: it’s as black as pitch outside, and the brigade’s in no case to march. Wait a few hours, till the men have had a chance to get sober!’

‘Damme, sir, do I command the brigade, or do you?’ demanded Vandeleur, crashing a fist on to the table, and making all the empty bottles jump.

‘You do, more’s the pity!’ retorted Harry, no respecter of persons.

‘I’ll tell you what!’ declared Vandeleur. ‘You’re an impudent young dog, sir! That’s what you are! Good mind to have you broke. Go and order the assembly!’

‘You’ll regret it if I do. Now, sir, only be reasonable! The brigade won’t get back to Alcala any the sooner for reeling off now as drunk as wheelbarrows! Give me till a couple of hours before dawn, and I’ll engage to have ’em all in fit marching-order!’

But the good General had imbibed enough of the wine of Arganda to make him obstinate. He would listen to no argument, so there was nothing for Harry to do but to go off to order the assembly to sound. The trumpets blared through the town, and out of every house men came tumbling, buckling on sword-belts, hooking jackets together, falling down steps, and into gutters, and rollicking up to the alarm posts in varying stages of inebriety. Such a noise of good-humoured riot was never before heard in Arganda; and staid citizens, who had gone to bed hours before, hung out of their windows in their nightcaps to see what was happening; while those officers who were capable of any sustained effort tried to get the division into some sort of soldierly shape.

‘If any one thing is more particularly damned than another, it’s a march of this kind!’ said Kincaid, in a rage. ‘What’s it for? Whose orders?’

‘Comes of having Hill in command. Old Hookey would never have played us such a trick,’ said Eeles. ‘Damn his eyes, I’ve got the worst jag I’ve had in months!’

‘Come on, boys!’ Private Hetherington sang out from the ranks, his shako over one eye. ‘Who’s for going rabbit-hunting with a dead ferret?’

‘Blur-an’-ouns, what did we come ’ere for if we was to turn cat-in-pan before we’ve ’ad time to play off our dust?’

‘Making panadas for the devil, that’s what we’re doing! ’Oo sent us ’ere?’ ‘Sure, an’ who would ut be but Fanner Hill, an’ he as wise as Waltham’s calf that ran nine miles to suck a bull?’

Cursing, stumbling over the cobbles, the division moved off into the darkness. The roads were rough, the way little known, and long before Alcala was reached Vandeleur was repenting of his obstinacy. ‘Where the devil are we?’ he asked testily, when a halt was called to discover which of two roads led to Alcala.

‘Lord, I don’t know, sir!” said Harry cheerfully. ‘Where are those guides of yours?’

‘Plundering the baggage-train for anything I know. Shall I give the order to bivouac, sir?’ ‘Damn it, no, we’ll push on! I wish I hadn’t started this march, but I did, and we’ll finish it. Get on, Harry, get on! Find those fellows of yours, and tell ’em I’ll have the hide off their backs if they don’t discover the right road!’

‘I’ve sent out a scouting-party, sir.’

Vandeleur grunted. ‘Very well. The devil’s in it I was a little bosky tonight. But the trouble with you, Harry, is that you think you command the brigade!’

Harry grinned. ‘I got in the way of it with General Drummond, sir. “Have you any orders for the pickets, sir?” I asked him, the first day I met him. “Pray, Mr Smith, are you my Brigade-Major?” says he. “I believe so sir.”-“Then, let me tell you,” says he, “it’s your duty to post the pickets, and mine to have a damned good dinner for you every day!” so that’s how we went on: he cooked the dinner, and I commanded the brigade.’