Читать книгу Flashman Papers 3-Book Collection 3: Flashman at the Charge, Flashman in the Great Game, Flashman and the Angel of the Lord - George Fraser MacDonald - Страница 13

Well, if I was in disgrace, I was also in good health, and that’s what matters. I might have been one of the three thousand dead, or of the shattered wounded lying shrieking through the dusk along that awful line of bluffs. There seemed to be no medical provision – among the British, anyway – and scores of our folk just lay writhing where they fell, or died in the arms of mates hauling and carrying them down to the beach hospitals. The Russian wounded lay in piles by the hundred round our bivouacs, crying and moaning all through the night – I can hear their sobbing “Pajalsta! pajalsta!” still. The camp ground was littered with spent shot and rubbish and broken gear among the pools of congealed blood – my stars, wouldn’t I just like to take one of our Ministers, or street-corner orators, or blood-lusting, breakfast-scoffing papas, over such a place as the Alma hills – not to let him see, because he’d just tut-tut and look anguished and have a good pray and not care a damn – but to shoot him in the belly with a soft-nosed bullet and let him die screaming where he belonged. That’s all they deserve.

Not that I cared a fig for dead or wounded that night. I had worries enough on my own account, for in brooding about the injustice of Raglan’s reproaches, I convinced myself that I’d be broke in the end. The loss of that mealy little German pimp swelled out of all proportion in my imagination, with the Queen calling me a murderer and Albert accusing me of high treason, and The Times trumpeting for my impeachment. It was only when I realized that the army might have other things to think about that I cheered up.

I was feeling as lonely as the policeman at Herne Bay¹⁴ when I loafed into Billy Russell’s tent, and found him scribbling away by a storm lantern, with Lew Nolan perched on an ammunition box, holding forth as usual.

“Two brigades of cavalry!” Nolan was saying. “Two brigades, enough to have pursued and routed the whole pack of ’em! And what do they do? Sit on their backsides, because Lucan’s too damned scared to order a bag of oats without a written order from Raglan. Lord Lucan? Bah! Lord bloody Look-on, more like.”

“Hm’m,” says Billy, writing away, and glanced up. “Here, Flash – you’ll know. Were the Highlanders first into the redoubt? I say yes, but Lew says not.¹⁵ Stevens ain’t sure, and I can’t find Campbell anywhere. What d’ye say?”

I said I didn’t know, and Nolan cried what the devil did it matter, anyway, they were only infantry. Billy, seeing he would get no peace from him, threw down his pen, yawned, and says to me:

“You look well used up, Flash. Are you all right? What’s the matter, old fellow?”

I told him Willy was lost, and he said aye, that was a pity, a nice lad, and I told him what Raglan had said to me, and at this Nolan forgot his horses for a minute, and burst out:

“By God, isn’t that of a piece? He’s lost the best part of five brigades, and he rounds on one unfortunate galloper because some silly little ass who shouldn’t have been here at all, at all, gets himself blown up by the Russians! If he was so blasted concerned for him, what did he let him near the field for in the first place? And if you was to wet-nurse him, why did he have you galloping your arse off all day? The man’s a fool! Aye, and a bad general, what’s worse – there’s a Russian army clear away, thanks to him and those idle Frogs, and we could have cut ’em to bits on this very spot! I tell you, Billy, this fellow’ll have to go.”

“Come, Lew, he’s won his fight,” says Russell, stroking his beard. “It’s too bad he’s set on you, Flash – but I’d lose no sleep over it. Depend upon it, he’s only voicing his own fears of what may be said to him – but he’s a decent old stick, and bears no grudges. He’ll have forgotten about it in a day or so.”

“You think so?” says I, brightening.

“I should hope so!” cries Nolan. “Mother of God, if he hasn’t more to think about, he should have. Here’s him and Lucan between ’em have let a great chance slip, but by the time Billy here has finished tellin’ the British public about how the matchless Guards and stern Caledonians swept the Muscovite horde aside on their bayonet points –”

“I like that,” says Billy, winking at me. “I like it, Lew; go on, you’re inspiring.”

“Ah, bah, the old fool’ll be thinking he’s another Wellington,” says Lew. “Aye, you can laugh, Russell – tell your readers what I’ve said about Lucan, though – I dare ye! That’d startle ’em!”

This talk cheered me up, for after all, it was what Russell thought – and wrote – that counted, and he never even mentioned Willy’s death in his despatches to The Times. I heard that Raglan later referred to it, at a meeting with his generals, and Cardigan, the dirty swine, said privately that he wondered why the Prince’s safety had been entrusted to a common galloper. But Lucan took the other side, and said only a fool would blame me for the death of another staff officer, and de Lacy Evans said Raglan should think himself lucky it was Willy he had lost and not me. Sound chaps, some of those generals.

And Nolan was right – Raglan and everyone else had enough to occupy them, after the Alma. The clever men were for driving on hard to Sevastopol, a bare twenty miles away, and with our cavalry in good fettle we could obviously have taken it. But the Frogs were too tired, or too sick, or too Froggy, if you ask me, and days were wasted, and the Ruskis managed to bolt the door in time.

What was worse, the carnage at Alma, and the cholera, had thinned the army horribly, there was no proper transport, and by the time we had lumbered on to Sevastopol peninsula we couldn’t have robbed a hen-roost. But the siege had to be laid, and Raglan, looking wearier all the time, was thrashing himself to be cheerful and enthusiastic, with his army wasting, and winter coming, and the Frogs groaning at him. Oh, he was brave and determined and ready to take on all the odds – the worst kind of general imaginable. Give me a clever coward every time (which, of course, is why I’m such a dam’ fine general myself).

So the siege was laid, the French and ourselves sitting down on the muddy, rain-sodden gullied plateau before Sevastopol, the dismalest place on earth, with no proper quarters but a few poor huts and tents, and everything to be carted up from Balaclava on the coast eight miles away. Soon the camp, and the road to it, was a stinking quagmire; everyone looked and felt filthy, the rations were poor, the work of preparing the siege was cruel hard (for the men, anyway), and all the bounce there had been in the army after Alma evaporated in the dank, feverish rain by day and the biting cold by night. Soon half of us were lousy, and the other half had fever or dysentery or cholera or all three – as some wag said, who’d holiday at Brighton if he could come to sunny Sevastopol instead?

I didn’t take any part in the siege operations myself, not because I was out of favour with Raglan, but for the excellent reason that like so many of the army I spent several weeks on the flat of my back with what was thought at first to be cholera, but was in fact a foul case of dysentery and wind, brought on by my own hoggish excesses. On the march south after the Alma I had been galloping a message from Airey to our advance guard, and had come on a bunch of our cavalry who had bushwhacked a Russian baggage train and were busily looting it.¹⁶ Like a good officer, I joined in, and bagged as much champagne as I could carry, and a couple of fur cloaks as well. The cloaks were splendid, but the champagne must have carried the germ of the Siberian pox or something, for within a day I was blown up like a sheep on weeds, and spewing and skittering damnably. They sent me down to a seedy little house in Balaclava, not far from where Billy Russell was established, and there I lay sweating and rumbling, and wishing I were dead. Part of it I don’t remember, so I suppose I must have been delirious, but my orderly looked after me well, and since I still had all the late Willy’s gear and provisions – not that I ate much, until the last week – I did tolerably well. Better at least than any other sick man in the army; they were being carted down to Balaclava in droves, rotten with cholera and fever, lying in the streets as often as not.

Lew Nolan came down to see me when I was mending, and gave me all the gossip – about how my old friend Fan Duberly was on hand, living on a ship in the bay, and how Cardigan’s yacht had arrived, and his noble lordship, pleading a weak chest, had deserted his Light Brigade for the comforts of life aboard, where he slept soft and stuffed his guts with the best. There were rumours, too, Lew told me, of Russian troops moving up in huge strength from the east, and he thought that if Raglan didn’t look alive, he’d find himself bottled up in the Sevastopol peninsula. But most of Lew’s talk was a great harangue against Lucan and Cardigan; to him, they were the clowns who had mishandled our cavalry so damnably and were preventing it earning the laurels which Lew thought it deserved. He was a dead bore on the subject, but I’ll not say he was wrong – we were both to find out all about that shortly.

For now, although I couldn’t guess it, as I lay pampering myself with a little preserved jellied chicken and Rhine wine – of which Willy’s store-chest yielded a fine abundance – that terrible day was approaching, that awful thunderclap of a day when the world turned upside down in a welter of powder-smoke and cannon-shot and steel, which no one who lived through it will ever forget. Myself least of all. I never thought that anything could make Alma or the Kabul retreat seem like a charabanc picnic, but that day did, and I was through it, dawn to dusk, as no other man was. It was sheer bad luck that it was the very day I returned to duty. Damn that Russian champagne; if it had kept me in bed just one day longer, what I’d have been spared. Mind you, we’d have lost India, for what that’s worth.

I had been up a day or two, riding a little up to the Balaclava Plain, and wondering if I was fit enough to look up Fan Duberly, and take up again the attempted seduction which had been so maddeningly frustrated in Wiltshire six years before. She’d ripened nicely, by what Lew said, and I hadn’t bestrode anything but a saddle since I’d left England – even the Turks didn’t fancy the Crim Tartar women, and anyway, I’d been ill. But I’d convalesced as long as I dared, and old Colin Campbell, who commanded in Balaclava, had dropped me a sour hint that I ought to be back with Raglan in the main camp up on the plateau. So on the evening of October 24 I got my orderly to assemble my gear, left Willy’s provisions with Russell, and loafed up to headquarters.

Whether I’d exerted myself too quickly, or it was the sound of the Russian bands in Sevastopol, playing their hellish doleful music, that kept me awake, I was taken damned ill in the night. My bowels were in a fearful state, I was blown out like a boiler, and I was unwise enough to treat myself with brandy, on the principle that if your guts are bad they won’t feel any worse for your being foxed. They do, though, and when my orderly suddenly tumbled me out before dawn, I felt as though I were about to give birth. I told him to go to the devil, but he insisted that Raglan wanted me, p.d.q., so I huddled into my clothes in the cold, shivering and rumbling and went to see what was up.

They were in a great sweat at Raglan’s post; word had come from Lucan’s cavalry that our advanced posts were signalling enemy in sight to the eastward, and gallopers were being sent off in all directions, with Raglan dictating messages over his shoulder while he and Airey pored over their maps.

“My dear Flashman,” says Raglan, when his eye lit on me, “why, you look positively unwell. I think you would be better in your berth.” He was all benevolent concern this morning – which was like him, of course. “Don’t you think he looks ill, Airey?” Airey agreed that I did, but muttered something about needing every staff rider we could muster, so Raglan tut-tutted and said he much regretted it, but he had a message for Campbell at Balaclava, and it would be a great kindness if I would bear it. (He really did talk like that, most of the time; consideration fairly oozed out of him.) I wondered if I should plead my belly, so to speak, but finding him in such a good mood, with the Willy business apparently forgotten, I gave him my brave, suffering smile, and pocketed his message, fool that I was.

I felt damned shaky as I hauled myself into the saddle, and resolved to take my time over the broken country that lay between headquarters and Balaclava. Indeed, I had to stop several times, and try to vomit, but it was no go, and I cantered on over the filthy road with its litter of old stretchers and broken equipment, until I came out on to the open ground some time after sunrise.

After the downpour of the night before, it was dawning into a beautiful clear morning, the kind of day when, if your innards aren’t heaving and squeaking, you feel like a fine gallop with the wind in your face. Before me the Balaclava Plain rolled away like a great grey-green blanket, and as I halted to have another unsuccessful retch, the scene that met my eyes was like a galloping field day. On the left of the plain, where it sloped up to the long line of the Causeway Heights, our cavalry were deployed in full strength, more than a thousand horsemen, like so many brilliant little puppets in the sunny distance, trotting in their squadrons, wheeling and reforming. About a mile away, nearest to me, I could easily distinguish the Light Brigade – the pink trousers of the Cherrypickers, the scarlet of Light Dragoons, and the blue tunics and twinkling lance-points of the 17th. The trumpets were tootling on the breeze, the words of command drifted across to me as clear as a bell, and even beyond the Lights I could see, closer in under the Causeway, and retiring slowly in my direction, the squadrons of the Heavy Brigade – the grey horses with their scarlet riders, the dark green of the Skins, and the hundreds of tiny glittering slivers of the sabres. It was for all the world like a green nursery carpet, with tiny toy soldiers deployed upon it, and as pretty as these pictures of reviews and parades that you see in the galleries.

Until you looked beyond, to where Causeway Heights faded into the haze of the eastern dawn, and you could see why our cavalry were retiring. The far slopes were black with scurrying ant-like figures – Russian infantry pouring up to the gun redoubts which we had established along the three miles of the Causeway; the thunder of cannon rolled continuously across the plain, the flashes of the Russian guns stabbing away at the redoubts, and the sparkle of their muskets was all along the far end of the Causeway. They were swarming over the gun emplacements, engulfing our Turkish gunners, and their artillery was pounding away towards our retreating cavalry, pushing it along under the shadow of the Heights.

I took all this in, and looked off across the plain to my right, where it sloped up into a crest protecting the Balaclava road. Along the crest there was a long line of scarlet figures, with dark green blobs where their legs should be – Campbell’s Highlanders, at a safe distance, thank God, from the Russian guns, which were now ranging nicely on the Heavy Brigade under the Heights. I could see the shot plumping just short of the horses, and hear the urgent bark of commands: a troop of the Skins scattered as a great column of earth leaped up among them, and then they reformed, trotting back under the lee of the Causeway.

Well, there was a mile of empty, unscathed plain between me and the Highlanders, so I galloped down towards them, keeping a wary eye on the distant artillery skirmish to my left. But before I’d got halfway to the crest I came on their outlying picket breakfasting round a fire in a little hollow, and who should I see but little Fanny Duberly, presiding over a frying-pan with half a dozen grinning Highlanders round her. She squealed at the sight of me, waving and shoving her pan aside; I swung down out of my saddle, bad belly and all, and would have embraced her, but she caught my hands at arms’ length. And then it was Harry and Fanny, and where have you sprung from, and all that nonsense and chatter, while she laughed and I beamed at her. She had grown prettier, I think, with her fair hair and blue eyes, and looked damned fetching in her neat riding habit. I longed to give her tits a squeeze, but couldn’t, with all those leering Highlanders nudging each other.

She had ridden up, she said, with Henry, her husband, who was in attendance on Lord Raglan, although I hadn’t seen him.

“Will there be a great battle to-day, Harry?” says she. “I am so glad Henry will be safely out of it, if there is. See yonder” – and she pointed across the plain towards the Heights – “where the Russians are coming. Is it not exciting? Why do the cavalry not charge them, Harry? Are you going to join them? Oh, I hope you will take care! Have you had any breakfast? My dear, you look so tired. Come and sit down, and share some of our haggis!”

If anything could have made me sick, it would have been that, but I explained that I hadn’t time to tattle, but must find Campbell. I promised to see her again, as soon as the present business was by, and advised her to clear off down to Balaclava as fast as she could go – it was astonishing, really, to see her picnicking there, as fresh as a May morning, and not much more than a mile away the Russian forces pounding away round the redoubts, and doubtless ready to sweep right ahead over the plain when they had regrouped.

The sergeant of Highlanders said Campbell was somewhere off with the Heavy Brigade, which was bad news, since it meant I must approach the firing, but there was nothing for it, so I galloped off north again, through the extended deployment of the Lights, who were now sitting at rest, watching the Heavies reforming. George Paget hailed me; he was sitting with one ankle cocked up on his saddle, puffing his cheroot, as usual.

“Have you come from Raglan?” cries he. “Where the hell are the infantry, do you know? We shall be sadly mauled at this rate, unless he moves soon. Look at the Heavies yonder; why don’t Lucan shift ’em back faster, out of harm’s way?” And indeed they were retiring slowly, it seemed to me, right under the shadow of the Heights, with the Russian fire still kicking up the clods round them as they came. I ventured forward a little way: I could see Lucan, and his staff, but no sign of Campbell, so I asked Morris, of the 17th, and he said Campbell had gone back across the plain, towards Balaclava, a few minutes since.

Well, that was better, since it would take me down to the Highlanders’ position, away from where the firing was. And yet, it suddenly seemed very secure in my present situation, with the blue tunics and lances of the 17th all round me, and the familiar stench of horse-flesh and leather, and the bits jingling and the fellows patting their horses’ necks and muttering to steady them against the rumble of the guns; there were troop horse artillery close by, banging back at the Russians, but it was still rather like a field day, with the plain all unmarked, and the uniforms bright and gay in the sunlight. I didn’t want to leave ’em – but there were the Highlanders drawn up near the crest across the plain southward: I must just deliver my message as quickly as might be, and then be off back to head-quarters.

So I turned my back to the Heights, and set off again through the ranks of the 17th and the Cherrypickers, and was halfway down the plain to the Highlanders on the crest when here came a little knot of riders moving up towards the cavalry. And who should it be but my bold Lord Cardigan, with Squire Brough and his other toadies, all in great spirits after a fine comfortable boozy night on his yacht, no doubt.

I hadn’t seen the man face to face since that night in Elspeth’s bedroom, and my bile rose up even at the thought of the bastard, so I cut him dead. When Brough hailed me, and asked what was the news I reined up, not even looking in Cardigan’s direction, and told Brough the Ruskis were over-running the far end of the Heights, and our horse were falling back.

“Ya-as,” says Cardigan to his toadies, “it is the usual foolishness. There are the Wussians, so our cavalry move in the other diwection. Haw-haw. You, there, Fwashman, what does Word Waglan pwopose to do?”

I continued to ignore him. “Well, Squire,” says I to Brough, “I must be off; can’t stand gossiping with yachtsmen, you know,” and I wheeled away, leaving them gaping, and an indignant “Haw-haw” sounding behind me.

But I hadn’t time to feel too satisfied, for in that moment there was a new thunderous cannonade from the Russians, much closer now; the whistle of shot sounded overhead, there was a great babble of shouting and orders from the cavalry behind me, the calls of the Lights and Heavies sounded, and the whole mass of our horse began to move off westward, retiring again. The cannonading grew, as the Russians turned their guns southward, I saw columns of earth ploughed up to the east of the Highlanders’ position, and with my heart in my mouth I buried my head in the horse’s mane and fairly flew across the turf. The shot was still falling short, thank God, but as I reached the crest a ball came skipping and rolling almost up to my horse’s hooves, and lay there, black and smoking, as I tore up to the Highlanders’ flank.

“Where is Sir Colin?” cries I, dismounting, and they pointed to where he was pacing down between the ranks in my direction. I went forward, and delivered my message.

“Oot o’ date,” says he, when he had read it. “Ye don’t look weel, Flashman. Bide a minute. I’ve a note here for Lord Raglan.” And he turned to one of his officers, but at that moment the shouting across the plain redoubled, there was the thunderous plumping of shot falling just beyond the Highland position, and Campbell paused to look across the plain towards the Causeway Heights.

“Aye,” says he, “there it is.”

I looked towards the Heights, and my heart came up into my throat.

Our cavalry was now away to the left, at the Sevastopol end of the plain, but on the Heights to the right, near the captured redoubts, the whole ridge seemed to have come alive. Even as we watched, the movement resolved itself into a great mass of cavalry – Russian cavalry, wheeling silently down the side of the Heights in our direction. They’ve told me since that there were only four squadrons, but they looked more like four brigades, blue uniforms and grey, with their sabres out, preparing to descend the long slope from the Heights that ran down towards our position.

It was plain as a pikestaff what they were after, and if I could have sprouted wings in that moment I’d have been fluttering towards the sea like a damned gull. Directly behind us the road to Balaclava lay open; our own cavalry were out of the hunt, too far off to the left; there was nothing between that horde of Russians and the Balaclava base – the supply line of the whole British army – but Campbell’s few hundred Highlanders, a rabble of Turks on our flank, and Flashy, full of wind and horror.

Campbell stared for a moment, that granite face of his set; then he pulled at his dreary moustache and roared an order. The ranks opened and moved and closed again, and now across our ridge there was a double line of Highlanders, perhaps a furlong from end to end, kneeling down a yard or so on the seaward side of the crest. Campbell looked along them from our stance at the right-hand extremity of the line, bidding the officers dress them. While they were doing it, there was a tremendous caterwauling from the distant flank, and there were the Turks, all order gone, breaking away from their positions in the face of the impending Russian charge, flinging down their arms and tearing headlong for the sea road behind us.

“Dross,” says Campbell.

I was watching the Turks, and suddenly, to their rear, riding towards us, and then checking and wheeling away southward, I recognized the fair hair and riding fig of Fanny Duberly. She was flying along as she passed our far flank, going like a little jockey – she could ride, that girl.

“Damn all society women,” says Campbell. And it occurred to me, even through the misery of my stomach and my rising fear, that Balaclava Plain that morning was more like the Row – Fanny Duberly out riding, and Cardigan ambling about haw-hawing.

I looked towards the Russians; they were rumbling down the slope now, a bare half-mile away; Campbell shouted again, and the long scarlet double rank moved forward a few paces, with a great swishing of their kilts and clatter of gear, and halted on the crest, the front rank kneeling and the second standing behind them. Campbell glanced across at the advancing mass of the Russian horse, measuring the distance.

“Ninety-third!” he shouted. “There is no retreat from here! Ye must stand!”

He had no need to tell me; I couldn’t have moved if I had wanted to. I could only gape at that wall of horsemen, galloping now, and then back at the two frail, scarlet lines that in a moment must be swept away into bloody rabble with the hooves smashing down on them and the sabres swinging; it was the finish, I knew, and nothing to do but wait trembling for it to happen. I found myself staring at the nearest kneeling Highlander, a huge, swarthy fellow with his teeth bared under a black moustache; I remember noticing the hair matting the back of his right hand as it gripped his musket. Beyond him there was a boy, gazing at the advancing squadrons with his mouth open; his lip was trembling.

“Haud yer fire until I give the wurr-rd!” says Campbell, and then quite deliberately he stepped a little out before the front rank and drew his broadsword, laying the great glittering blade across his chest. Christ, I thought, that’s a futile thing to do – the ground was trembling under our feet now, and the great quadruple rank of horsemen was a bare two hundred yards away, sweeping down at the charge, sabres gleaming, yelling and shouting as they bore down on us, a sea of flaring horse heads and bearded faces above them.

“Present!” shouts Campbell, and moved past me in behind the front rank. He stopped behind the boy with the trembling lip. “Ye never saw the like o’ that comin’ doon the Gallowgate,” says he. “Steady now, Ninety-third! Wait for my command!”

They were a hundred yards away now, that thundering tide of men and horses, the hooves crashing like artillery on the turf. The double bank of muskets with their fixed bayonets covered them; the locks were back, the fingers hanging on the triggers; Campbell was smiling sourly beneath his moustache, the madman; he glanced to his left along the silent lines – give the word, damn you, you damned old fool, I wanted to shout, for they were a bare fifty yards off, in a split second they would be into us, he had left it too late –

“Fire!” he bellowed, and like one huge bark of thunder the front-rank volley crashed out, the smoke billowed back in our faces, and beyond it the foremost horsemen seemed to surge up in a great wave; there was a split-second of screaming confusion, with beasts plunging and rearing, a hideous chorus of yells from the riders, and the great line crashed down on the turf before us, the men behind careering into the fallen horses and riders, trying to jump them or pull clear, trampling them, hurtling over them in a smashing tangle of limbs and bodies.

“Fire!” roars Campbell above the din, and the pieces of the standing rank crashed together into the press; it seemed to shudder at the impact, and behind it the Russian ranks wheeled and stumbled in confusion, men screaming and going down, horses lashing out blindly, sabres gleaming and flying. As the smoke cleared there was a great tangled bloody bank of stricken men and beasts wallowing within a few yards of the kneeling Highlanders – they’ll tell you, some of our historians, that Campbell fired before they reached close range, but here’s one who can testify that one Russian, with a fur-crested helmet and pale blue tunic rolled right to within a foot of us; the swarthy Highlander nearest me didn’t have to advance a step to plunge his bayonet into the Russian’s body.

A great yell went up from the Ninety-third; the front rank seemed to leap forward, but Campbell was before them, bawling them back. “Damn your eagerness!” cries he. “Stand fast! Reload!”

They dropped back, snarling like dogs, and Campbell turned and calmly surveyed the wreckage of the Russian ranks. There were beasts thrashing about everywhere and men crawling blindly away, the din of screaming and groaning was fearful, and a great reek that you could literally see was steaming up from them. Behind, the greater part of the Russian squadrons was turning, reforming, and for a moment I thought they were coming again, but they moved off back towards the Heights, closing their ranks as they went.

“Good,” says Campbell, and his sword grated back into its scabbard.

“Ye nivcr saw a sight like that goin’ back up the Gallowgate, Sir Colin,” pipes a voice from somewhere, and they began to laugh and cheer, and yell their heathenish slogans, shaking their muskets, and Campbell grinned and pulled at his moustache again. He saw me – I hadn’t stirred a yard since the charge began, I’d been so petrified – and walked across.

“I’ll add a line to my message for Lord Raglan,” says he, and looks at me. “Ye’ve mair colour in yer cheeks now, Flashman. Field exercises wi’ the Ninety-third must agree wi’ ye.”

And so, with those kilted devils still holding their ranks, and the Russians dying and moaning before them, I waited while he dictated his message to one of his aides. Now that the terror was past, my belly was aching horribly and I felt thoroughly ill again, but not so ill that I wasn’t able to note (and admire) the carriage of the retreating Russian cavalry. In charging, I had noticed how they had opened their ranks at the canter and then closed them at the gallop, which isn’t easy; now they were doing the same thing as they retired towards the Heights, and I thought, these fellows ain’t so slovenly as we thought. I remember thinking they’d perhaps startle Jim the Bear and his Light Brigade – but most of all, from that moment of aftermath, I can still see vividly that tangled pile of Russian dead, and sprawled out before them the body of an officer, a big grey-bearded man with the front of his blue tunic soaked in blood, lying on his back with one knee bent up, and his horse standing above him, nuzzling at the dead face.

Campbell put a folded paper into my hand and stood, shading his eyes with a hand under his bonnet-rim, as he watched the Russian horse canter up the Causeway Heights.

“Poor management,” says he. “They’ll no’ come this way again. In the meantime, I’ve said to Lord Raglan that in my opeenion the main Russian advance will now be directed north of the Causeway, and will doubtless be wi’ artillery and horse against our cavalry. What it is doin’ sittin’ yonder, I cannae – but, hollo! Is that Scarlett movin’? Hand me that glass, Cattenach. See yonder.”

The Russian cavalry were now topping the Causeway ridge, vanishing from our view, but on the plain farther left, perhaps half a mile from us, there was movement in the ranks of our Heavy Brigade: a sudden uniform twinkle of metal as the squadrons nearest to us turned.

“They’re coming this way,” says someone, and Campbell snapped his glass shut.

“Behind the fair,” says he, glumly – I never saw him impatient yet. Where other men would get angry and swear, Campbell simply got more melancholy. “Flashman – on your way to Lord Raglan, I’ll be obliged if you’ll present my compliments to General Scarlett, or Lord Lucan, whichever comes first in your road, and tell them that in my opeenion they’ll do well to hold the ground they have, and prepare for acteevity on the northern flank. Away wi’ ye, sir.”

I needed no urging. The farther I could get from that plain, the better I’d be suited, for I was certain Campbell was right. Having captured the eastern end of the Causeway Heights, and run their cavalry over the central ridge facing us, it was beyond doubt that the Russians would be moving up the valley north of the Heights, advancing on the plateau position which we occupied before Sevastopol. God knew what Raglan proposed to do about that, but in the meantime he was holding our cavalry on the southern plain – to no good purpose. They hadn’t budged an inch to take the retreating Russian cavalry in flank, as they might have done, and now, after the need for their support had passed, the Heavies were moving down slowly towards Campbell’s position.

I rode through their ranks – Dragoon Guards and a few Skins, riding in open order, eyeing me curiously as I galloped through – “That’s Flashman, ain’t it?” cries someone, but I didn’t pause. Ahead of me I could see the little knot of coloured figures, red and blue, of Scarlett and his staff; as I reined up, they were cheering and laughing, and old Scarlett waved his hat to me.

“Ho-ho, Flashman!” cries he. “Were you down there with the Sawnies? Capital work, what? That’s a bloody nose for Ivan, I say. Ain’t it, though, Elliot? Dam’ fine, dam’ fine! And where are you off to, Flashman, my son?”

“Message to Lord Raglan, sir,” says I. “But Sir Colin Campbell also presents his compliments, and advises that you should move no nearer to Balaclava at present.”

“Does he, though? Beatson, halt the Dragoons, will you? Now then, why not? Lord Lucan has ordered us to support the Turks, you know, in case of Russian movement towards Balaclava.”

“Sir Colin expects no further movement there, sir. He bids you look to your northern flank,” and I pointed to the Causeway Heights, only a few hundred yards away. “Anyway, sir, there are no longer any Turks to support. Most of ’em are probably on the beach by now.”

“That’s true, bigod!” Scarlett exploded in laughter. He was a fat, cheery old Falstaff, mopping his bald head with a hideously-coloured scarf, and then dabbing the sweat from his red cheeks. “What d’ye think, Elliot? No point in goin’ down to Campbell that I can see; he and his red-shanks don’t need support, that’s certain.”

“True, sir. But there is no sign of Russian movement to our north, as yet.”

“No,” said Scarlett, “that’s so – But I trust Campbell’s judgment, ye know; clever fella. If he smells Ruskis to our north, beyond the Heights, well, I dunno. I trust an old hound any day, what?” He sniffed and mopped himself again, tugging at his puffy white whiskers. “Tell you what, Elliot, I think we’ll just hold on here, and see what breaks cover, hey? What d’ye say to that, Beatson? Flashman? No harm in waitin’, is there?”

He could dig trenches for all I cared; I was already measuring the remaining distance across the plain westward; once in the gullies I’d be out of harm’s way, and could pick my way to Raglan’s head-quarters at my leisure. North of us, the ground sloping up to the Heights through an old vineyard was empty; so was the crest beyond, but the thump of cannon from behind it seemed to be growing closer to my nervous imagination. There was an incessant whine and thump of shot; Beatson was scanning the ridge anxiously through his glass.

“Campbell’s right, sir,” says he. “They must be up there in the north valley in strength.”

“How d’ye know?” says Scarlett, goggling.

“The firing, sir. Listen to it – that’s not just cannon. There – you hear? That’s Whistling Dick! If they have mortars with ’em, they’re not skirmishing!”

“By God!” says Scarlett. “Well I’m damned! I can’t tell one from another, but if you say so, Beatson, I –”

“Look yonder!” It was one of his young gallopers, up in his stirrups with excitement, pointing. “The ridge, sir! Look at ’em come!”

We looked, and for the second time that day I forgot my gurgling aching belly in a freezing wave of fear. Slowly topping the crest, in a great wave of colour and dancing steel, was a long rank of Russian horsemen, and behind them another, and then another, moving at a walk. They came over the ridge as if they were in review, extended line after line, and then slowly closed up, halting on the near slope of the ridge, looking down at us. God knows how far their line ran from flank to flank, but there were thousands of them, hanging over us like an ocean roller frozen in the act of breaking, a huge body of blue and silver hussars on the left, and to the right the grey and white of their dragoons.

“By God!” cries Scarlett. “By God! Those are Russians – damn ’em!”

“Left about!” Beatson was yelling. “Greys, stand fast! Cunningham, close ’em up! Inniskillings – close order! Connor, Flynn, keep ’em there! Curzon, get those squadrons of the Fifth up here, lively now!”

Scarlett was sitting gaping at the ridge, damning his eyes and the Russians alternately until Beatson jerked at his sleeve.

“Sir! We must prepare to receive them! When they take the brake off they’ll roll down –”

“Receive ’em?” says Scarlett, coming back to earth. “What’s that, Beatson? Damned if I do!” He reared up in his stirrups, glaring along to the left, where the Greys’ advanced squadrons were being dressed to face the Russian force. “What? What? Connor, what are you about there?” He was gesticulating to the right now, waving his hat. “Keep your damned Irishmen steady there! Wild devils, those! Where’s Curzon, hey?”

“Sir, they have the slope of us!” Beatson was gripping Scarlett by the sleeve, rattling urgently in his ear. “They outflank us, too – I reckon that line’s three times the length of ours, and when they charge they can sweep round and take us flank, both sides, and front! They’ll swallow us, sir, if we break – we must try to hold fast!”

“Hold fast nothin’!” says Scarlett, grinning all over his great red cheeks. “I didn’t come all this way to have some dam’ Cossack open the ball! Look at ’em, there, the saucy bastards! What? What? Well, they’re there, and we’re here, and I’m goin’ to chase the scoundrels all the way to Moscow! What, Elliot? Here, you, Flashman, come to my side, sir!”

You may gather my emotions at hearing this; I won’t attempt to describe them. I stared at this purpling old lunatic in bewilderment, and tried to say something about my message to Raglan, but the impetuous buffoon grabbed at my bridle and hauled me along as he took post in front of his squadrons.

“You shall tell Lord Raglan presently that I have engaged a force of enemy cavalry on my front an’ dispersed ’em!” bawls he. “Beatson, Elliot, see those lines dressed! Where are the Royals, hey? Steady, there, Greys! Steady now! Inniskillings, look to that dressing, Flynn! Keep close to me, Flashman, d’ye hear? Like enough I’ll have somethin’ to add to his lordship. Where the devil’s Curzon, then? Damn the boy, if it’s not women it’s somethin’ else! Trumpeter, where are you? Come to my left side! Got your tootler, have you? Capital, splendid!”

It was unbelievable, this roaring fat old man, waving his hat like some buffer at a cricket match, while Beatson tried to shout sense into him.

“You cannot move from here, sir! It is all uphill! We must hold our ground – there’s no other hope!” He pointed up hill frantically. “Look, they’re moving, sir! We must hold fast!”

And sure enough, up on the Heights a quarter of a mile away, the great Russian line was beginning to advance, shoulder to shoulder, blue and silver and grey, with their sabres at the present; it was a sight to send you squealing for cover, but there I was, trapped at this idiot’s elbow, with the squadrons of the Greys hemming us in behind.

“You cannot advance, sir!” shouts Beatson again.

“Can’t I, by God!” roars Scarlett, throwing away his hat. “You just watch me!” He lugged out his sabre and waved it. “Ready, Greys? Ready, old Skins? Remember Waterloo, you fellas, what? Trumpeter-sound the … the thing, whatever it is! Oh, the devil! Come on, Flashman! Tally-ho!”

And he dug in his heels, gave one final yell of “Come on, you fellas!” and set his horse at the hill like a madman. There was a huge, crashing shout from behind, the squadrons leaped forward, my horse reared, and I found myself galloping along, almost up Scarlett’s dock, with Beatson at my elbow shouting, “Oh, what the blazes – charge! Trumpeter, charge! charge! charge!”

They were all stark, raving mad, of course. When I think of them – and me, God help me – tearing up that hill, and that overwhelming force lurching down towards us, gathering speed with every step, I realize that there’s no end to human folly, or human luck, cither. It was ridiculous, it was nonsense, that old red-faced pantaloon, who’d never fired a shot or swung a sabre in action before, and was fit for nothing but whipping off hounds, urging his charger up that hill, with the whole Heavy Brigade at his heels, and poor old suffering Flashy jammed in between, with nothing to do but hope to God that by the time the two irresistible forces met, I’d be somewhere back in the mob behind.

And the brutes were enjoying it, too! Those crazy Ulstermen were whooping like Apaches, and the Greys, as they thundered forward, began to make that hideous droning noise deep in their throats; I let them come up on my flanks, their front rank hemming me in with glaring faces and glittering blades on either side; Scarlett was yards ahead, brandishing his sabre and shouting, the Russian mass was at the gallop, sweeping towards us like a great blue wave, and then in an instant we were surging into them, men yelling, horses screaming, steel clashing all round, and I was clinging like a limpet to my horse’s right side, Cheyenne fashion, left hand in the mane and right clutching my Adams revolver. I wasn’t breaking surface in that melee if I could help it. There were Greys all round me, yelling and cursing, slashing with their sabres at the hairy blue coats – “Give ’em the point! The point!” yelled a voice, and I saw a Greys trooper dashing the hilt of his sword into a bearded face and then driving his point into the falling man’s body. I let fly at a Russian in the press, and the shot took him in the neck, I think; then I was dashed aside and swept away in the whirl of fighting, keeping my head ducked low, squeezing my trigger whenever I saw a blue or grey tunic, and praying feverishly that no chance slash would sweep me from the saddle.

I suppose it lasted five or ten minutes; I don’t know. It seemed only a few seconds, and then the whole mass was struggling up the hill, myself roaring and blaspheming with the best of them; my revolver was empty, my hat was gone, so I dragged out my sabre, bawling with pretended fury, and seeing nothing but grey horses, gathered that I was safe.

“Come on!” I roared. “Come on! Into the bastards! Cut ’em to bits!” I made my horse rear and waved my sword, and as a stricken Russian came blundering through the mob I lunged at him, full force, missed, and finished up skewering a fallen horse. The wrench nearly took me out of my saddle, but I wasn’t letting that sabre go, not for anything, and as I tugged it free there was a tremendous cheering set up – “Huzza! huzza! huzza” – and suddenly there were no Russians among us, Scarlett, twenty yards away, was standing in his stirrups waving a blood-stained sabre and yelling his head off, the Greys were shaking their hats and their fists, and the rout of that great mass of enemy cavalry was trailing away towards the crest.

“They’re beat!” cries Scarlett. “They’re beat! Well done, you fellas! What, Beatson? Hey, Elliot? Can’t charge uphill, hey? Damn ’em, damn ’em, we did it! Hurrah!”

Now it is a solemn fact, but I’ll swear I didn’t see above a dozen corpses on the ground around me as the Greys reordered their squadrons, and the Skins closed in on the right, with the Royals coming up behind. I still don’t understand it – why the Russians, with the hill behind ’em, didn’t sweep us all away, with great slaughter. Or why, breaking as they did, they weren’t cut to pieces by our sabres. Except that I remember one or two of the Greys complaining that they hadn’t been able to make their cuts tell; they just bounced off the Russian tunics. Anyway, the Ruskis broke, thank heaven, and away beneath us, to our left, the Light Brigade were setting up a tremendous cheer, and it was echoing along the ridge to our left, and on the greater heights beyond.

“Well done!” shouts Scarlett. “Well done, you Greys! Well done, Flashman, you are a gallant fellow! What? Hey? That’ll show that damned Nicholas, what? Now then, Flashman, off with you to Lord Raglan – tell him we’ve … well, set about these chaps and driven ’em off, you sec, and that I shall hold my position, what, until further orders. You understand? Capital!” He shook with laughter, and hauled out his coloured scarf for another mop at his streaming face. “Tell ye what, Flashman; I don’t know much about fightin’, but it strikes me that this Russian business is like huntin’ in Ireland – confused and primitive, what, but damned interestin’!”

I reported his words to Raglan, exactly as he spoke them, and the whole staff laughed with delight, the idiots. Of course, they were safe enough, snug on the top of the Sapoune Ridge, which lay at the western end of Causeway Heights, and I promise you I had taken my time getting there. I’d ridden like hell on my spent horse from the Causeway, across the north-west corner of the plain, when Scarlett dismissed me, but once into the safety of the gullies, with the noise of Russian gunfire safely in the distance, I had dismounted to get my breath, quiet my trembling heart-strings, and try to ease my wind-gripped bowels, again without success. I was a pretty bedraggled figure, I suppose, by the time I came to the top of Sapoune, but at least I had a bloody sabre, artlessly displayed – Lew Nolan’s eyes narrowed and he swore enviously at the sight: he wasn’t to know it had come from a dead Russian horse.

Raglan was beaming, as well he might, and demanded details of the action I had seen. So I gave ’em, fairly offhand, saying I thought the Highlanders had behaved pretty well – “Yes, and if we had just followed up with cavalry we might have regained the whole Causeway by now!” pipes Nolan, at which Airey told him to be silent, and Raglan looked fairly stuffy. As for the Heavies – well, they had seen all that, but I said it had been warm work, and Ivan had got his bellyful, from what I could see.

“Gad, Flashy, you have all the luck!” cries Lew, slapping his thigh, and Raglan clapped me on the shoulder.

“Well done, Flashman,” says he. “Two actions today, and you have been in the thick of both. I fear you have been neglecting your staff duties in your eagerness to be at the enemy, eh?” And he gave me his quizzical beam, the old fool. “Well, we shall say no more about that.”

I looked confused, and went red, and muttered something about not being able to abide these damned Ruskis, and they all laughed again, and said that was old Flashy, and the young gallopers, the pink-cheeked lads, looked at me with awe. If it hadn’t been for my aching belly, I’d have been ready to enjoy myself, now that the horror of the morning was past, and the cold sweat of reaction hadn’t had a chance to set in. I’d come through again, I told myself – twice, no less, and with new laurels. For although we were too close to events just then to know what would be said later – well, how many chaps have you heard of who stood with the Thin Red Line and took part in the Charge of the Heavy Brigade? None, ’cos I’m the only one, damned unwilling and full of shakes, but still, I’ve dined out on it for years. That – and the other thing that was to follow.

But in the meantime, I was just thanking my stars for safety, and rubbing my inflamed guts. (Someone said later that Flashman was more anxious about his bowels than he was about the Russians, and had taken part in all the charges to try to ease his wind.) I sat there with the staff, gulping and massaging, happy to be out of the battle, and taking a quiet interest while Lord Raglan and his team of idiots continued to direct the fortunes of the day.

Now, of that morning at Balaclava I’ve told you what I remember, as faithfully as I can, and if it doesn’t tally with what you read elsewhere, I can’t help it. Maybe I’m wrong, or maybe the military historians are: you must make your own choice. For example, I’ve read since that there were Turks on both flanks of Campbell’s Highlanders, whereas I remember ’em only on the left flank; again, my impression of the Heavy Brigade action is that it began and ended in a flash, but I gather it must have taken Scarlett some little time to turn and dress his squadrons. I don’t remember that. It’s certain that Lucan was on hand when the charge began, and I’ve been told he actually gave the word to advance – well, I never even saw him. So there you are; it just shows that no one can see everything.¹⁷

I mention this because, while my impressions of the early morning are fairly vague, and consist of a series of coloured and horrid pictures, I’m in no doubt about what took place in the late forenoon. That is etched forever; I can shut my eyes and see it all, and feel the griping pain ebbing and clawing at my guts – perhaps that sharpened my senses, who knows? Anyway, I have it all clear; not only what happened, but what caused it to happen. I know, better than anyone else who ever lived, why the Light Brigade was launched on its famous charge, because I was the man responsible, and it wasn’t wholly an accident. That’s not to say I’m to blame – if blame there is, it belongs to Raglan, the kind, honourable, vain old man. Not to Lucan, or to Cardigan, or to Nolan, or to Airey, or even to my humble self: we just played our little parts. But blame? I can’t even hold it against Raglan, not now. Of course, your historians and critics and hypocrites are full of virtuous zeal to find out who was “at fault”, and wag their heads and say “Ah, you see,” and tell him what should have been done, from the safety of their studies and lecture-rooms – but I was there, you see, and while I could have wrung Raglan’s neck, or blown him from the muzzle of a gun, at the time – well, it’s all by now, and we either survived it or we didn’t. Proving someone guilty won’t bring the six hundred to life again – most of ’em would be dead by now anyway. And they wouldn’t blame anyone. What did that trooper of the 17th say afterwards: “We’re ready to go in again.” Good luck to him, I say; once was enough for me – but, don’t you understand, nobody else has the right to talk of blame, or blunders? Just us, the living and the dead. It was our indaba. Mind you, I could kick Raglan’s arse for him, and my own.

I sat up there on the Sapoune crest, feeling bloody sick and tired, refusing the sandwiches that Billy Russell offered me, and listening to Lew Nolan’s muttered tirade about the misconduct of the battle so far. I hadn’t much patience with him – he hadn’t been risking his neck along with Campbell and Scarlett, although he no doubt wished he had – but in my shaken state I wasn’t ready to argue. Anyway, he was fulminating against Lucan and Cardigan and Raglan mostly, which was all right by me.

“If Cardigan had taken in the Lights, when the Heavies were breaking up the Ruskis, we’d have smashed ’em all by this,” says he. “But he wouldn’t budge, damn him – he’s as bad as Lucan. Won’t budge without orders, delivered in the proper form, with nice salutes, and ‘Yes, m’lord’ an’ ‘if your lordship pleases’. Christ – cavalry leaders! Cromwell’d turn in his grave, bad cess to him. And look at Raglan yonder – does he know what to do? He’s got two brigades o’ the best horsemen in Europe, itchin’ to use their sabres, an’ in front of ’em a Russian army that’s shakin’ in its boots after the maulin’ Campbell an’ Scarlett have given ’em – but he sits there sendin’ messages to the infantry! The infantry, bigod, that’re still gettin’ out of their beds somewhere. Jaysus, it makes me sick!”

He was in a fine taking, but I didn’t mind him much. At the same time, looking down on the panorama beneath us, I could see there was something in what he said. I’m not Hannibal, but I’ve picked up a wrinkle or two in my time, about ground and movement, and it looked to me as though Raglan had it in his grasp to do the Russians some no-good, and maybe even hand them a splendid licking, if he felt like it. Not that I cared, you understand; I’d had enough, and was all for a quiet life for everybody. But anyway, this is how the land lay.

The Sapoune, on which we stood, is a great bluff rising hundreds of feet above the plain. Looking east from it, you see below you a shallow valley, perhaps two miles long and half a mile broad; to the north, there is a little clump of heights on which the Russians had established guns to command that side of the valley. On the south the valley is bounded by the long spine of the Causeway Heights, running east from the Sapoune for two or three miles. The far end of the valley was fairly hazy, even with the strong sunlight, but you could see the Russians there as thick as fleas on a dog’s back – guns, infantry, cavalry, everything except Tsar Nick himself, tiny puppets in the distance, just holding their ground. They had guns on the Causeway, too, pointing north; as I watched I saw the nearest team of them unlimbering just beside the spot where the Heavies’ charge had ended.

So there it was, plain as a pool table – a fine empty valley with the main force of the Russians at the far end of it, and us at the near end, but with Ruskis on the heights to either side, guns and sharpshooters both – you could see the grey uniforms of their infantry moving among their cannon down on the Causeway, not a mile and a half away.

Directly beneath where I stood, at the near end of the valley, our cavalry had taken up station just north of the Causeway, the Heavies slightly nearer the Sapoune and to the right, the Lights just ahead of them and slightly left. They looked as though you could have lobbed a stone into the middle of them – I could easily make out Cardigan, threading his way behind the ranks of the 17th, and Lucan with his gallopers, and old Scarlett, with his bright scarf thrown over one shoulder of his coat – they were all sitting out there waiting, tiny figures in blue and scarlet and green, with here and there a plumed hat, and an occasional bandage: I noticed one trooper of the Skins binding a stocking on to the forefoot of his charger, the little dark-green figure crouched down at the horse’s hooves. The distant pipe of voices drifted up from the plain, and from the far end of the Causeway a popping of musketry; for the rest it was all calm and still, and it was this tranquillity that was driving Lew to a frenzy, the blood-thirsty young imbecile.

Well, thinks I, there they all are, doing nothing and taking no harm; let ’em be, and let’s go home. For it was plain to see the Ruskis were going to make no advance up the valley towards the Sapoune; they’d had their fill for the day, and were content to hold the far end of the valley and the heights either side. But Raglan and Airey were forever turning their glasses on the Causeway, at the Russian artillery and infantry moving among the redoubts they’d captured from the Turks; I gathered both our infantry and cavalry down in the plain should have been moving to push them out, but nothing was happening, and Raglan was getting the frets.

“Why does not Lord Lucan move?” I heard him say once, and again: “He has the order; what delays him now?” Knowing Look-on, I could guess he was huffing and puffing and laying the blame on someone else. Raglan kept sending gallopers down – Lew among them – to tell Lucan, and the infantry commanders, to get on with it, but they seemed maddeningly obtuse about his orders, and wanted to wait for our infantry to come up, and it was this delay that was fretting Raglan and sending Lew half-crazy.

“Why doesn’t Raglan make ’em move, dammit?” says he, coming over to Billy Russell and me after reporting back to Raglan. “It’s too bad! If he would give ’em one clear simple command, to push in an’ sweep those fellows off the Causeway – oh, my God! An’ he won’t listen to me – I’m a young pup green behind the ears. The cavalry alone could do it in five minutes – it’s about time Cardigan earned his general’s pay, anyway!”

I approved heartily of that, myself. Every time I heard Cardigan’s name mentioned, or saw his hateful boozy vulture face, I remembered that vile scene in Elspeth’s bedroom, and felt my fury boiling up. Several times it had occurred to me on the campaign that it would be a capital thing if he could be induced into action where he might well be hit between the legs and so have his brains blown out, but he’d not looked like taking a scratch so far. And there seemed scant chance of it today; I heard Raglan snapping his glass shut with impatience, and saying to Airey: “I despair almost of moving our horse. It looks as though we shall have to rely on Cambridge alone – whenever his infantry come up! Oh, this is vexing! We shall accomplish nothing against the Causeway positions at this rate!”

And just at that moment someone sang out: “My lord! See there – the guns are moving! The guns in the second redoubt – the Cossacks are getting them out!”

Sure enough, there were Russian horsemen limbering up away down the Causeway crest, tugging at a little toy cannon in the captured Turkish emplacement. They had tackles on it, and were obviously intent on carrying it off to the main Russian army. Raglan stared at it through his glass, his face working.

“Airey!” cries he. “This is intolerable! What is Lucan thinking of – why, these fellows will clear the guns away before our advance begins!”

“He is waiting for Cambridge, I suppose, my lord,” says Airey, and Raglan swore, for once, and continued to gaze fretfully down on the Causeway.

Lew was writhing with impatience in his saddle. “Oh, Christ!” he moaned softly. “Send in Cardigan, man – never mind the bloody infantry. Send in the Lights!”

Good idea, thinks I – let Jim the Bear skirmish into the redoubts, and get a Cossack lance where it’ll do most good. So you may say it was out of pure malice towards Cardigan that I piped up – taking care that my back was to Raglan, but talking loud enough for him to hear:

“There goes our record – Wellington never lost a gun, you know.”

I’ve heard since, from a galloper who was at Raglan’s side, that it was those words, invoking the comparison with his God Wellington, that stung him into action – that he started like a man shot, that his face worked, and he jerked at his bridle convulsively. Maybe he’d have made up his mind without my help – but I’ll be honest and say that I doubt it. He’d have waited for the infantry. As it was he went pale and then red, and snapped out:

“Airey – another message to Lord Lucan! We can delay no longer – he must move without the infantry. Tell him – ah, he is to advance the cavalry rapidly to the front, to prevent the enemy carrying off the guns – ah, to follow the enemy and prevent them. Yes. Yes. He may take troop horse artillery, at his discretion. There – that will do. You have it, Airey? Read it back, if you please.”

I see it so clearly still – Airey’s head bent over the paper, jabbing at the words with his pencil, as he read back (more or less in Raglan’s words, certainly in the same sense), Nolan’s face alight with joy beside me – “At last, at last, thank God!” he was muttering – and Raglan sitting, nodding carefully. Then he cried out: “Good. It is to be acted on at once – make that clear!”

“Ah, that’s me darlin’!” whispers Lew, and nudged me. “Well done, Flashy, me boy – you’ve got him movin’!”

“Send it immediately,” Raglan was telling Airey. “Oh, and notify Lord Lucan that there are French cavalry on his left. Surely that should suffice.” And he opened his glass again, looking down at Causeway Heights. “Send the fastest galloper.”

I had a moment’s apprehension at that – having started the ball, I’d no wish to be involved – but Raglan added: “Where is Nolan? – yes, Nolan,” and Lew, beside himself with excitement, wheeled his horse beside Airey, grabbed at the paper, tucked it in his gauntlet, smacked down his forage cap, threw Raglan the fastest of salutes, and would have been off like a shot, but Raglan stayed him, repeating that the message was of the utmost importance, that it was to be delivered with all haste to Lucan personally, and that it was vital to act at once, before the Ruskis could make off with our guns.¹⁸ All unnecessary repetition of course, and Lew was in a fever, going pink with impatience.

“Away, then!” cries Raglan at last, and Lew was over the brow in a twinkling, with a flurry of dust – showy devil – and Raglan shouting after him: “At once, Nolan – tell Lord Lucan at once, you understand.”

That’s how they sent Nolan off – that and no more, on my oath. And so I come to the point with which I began this memoir, with Raglan having a second thought, and shouting to Airey to send after him, and Airey looking round, and myself retiring modestly, you remember, and Airey spotting me and gesturing me violently up beside him.

Well, you know what I thought, of the unreasoning premonition that I had, that this would be the ultimate terror of that memorable day in which I had, much against my will, already been charged at by, and charged against, overwhelming hordes of Russians. There was nothing, really, to be agitated about, up there on the heights – I was merely to be sent after Nolan, with some addition or correction. But I felt the finger of doom on me, I don’t know why, as I scrambled aboard a fresh horse with Raglan and Airey clamouring at me.

“Flashman,” says Raglan, “Nolan must make it clear to Lord Lucan – he is to behave defensively, and attempt nothing against his better judgment. Do you understand me?”

Well, I understood the words, but what the hell Lucan was expected to make of them, I couldn’t see. Told to advance, to attack the enemy, and yet to act defensively. But it was nothing to me; I repeated the order, word for word, making sure Airey could hear me, and then went over the bluff after Lew.

It was as steep as hell’s half acre, like a seaside sandcliff shot across by grassy ridges. At any other time I’d have picked my way down nice and leisurely, but with Raglan and the rest looking down, and in full view of our cavalry in the plain, I’d no choice but to go hell-for-leather. Besides, I wasn’t going to let that cocky little pimp Nolan distance me – I may not be proud of much, but I fancied myself against any galloper in the army, and was determined to overtake him before he reached Lucan. So down I went, with the game little mare under me skipping like a mountain goat, sliding on her haunches, careering headlong, and myself clinging on with my knees aching and my hands on the mane, jolting and swaying wildly, and in the tail of my eye Lew’s red cap jerking crazily on the escarpment below.

I was the better horseman. He wasn’t twenty yards out on the level when I touched the bottom and went after him like a bolt, yelling to him to hold on. He heard me, and reined up, cursing, and demanding to know what was the matter. “On with you!” cries I, as I came alongside, and as we galloped I shouted my message.

He couldn’t make it out, but had to pluck the note from his glove and squint at it while he rode. “What the hell does it mean in the first place?” cries he. “It says here, ‘advance rapidly to the front’. Well, God love us, the guns ain’t in front; they’re in flank front if they’re anywhere.”

“Search me,” I shouted. “But he says Look-on is to act defensively, and undertake nothing against his better judgment. So there!”

“Defensive?” cries Lew. “Defensive be damned! He must have said offensive – how the hell could he attack defensively? And this order says nothin’ about Lucan’s better judgment. For one thing, he’s got no more judgment than Mulligan’s bull pup!”

“Well, that’s what Raglan said!” I shouted. “You’re bound to deliver it.”

“Ah, damn them all, what a set of old women!” He dug in his spurs, head down, shouting across to me as we raced towards the rear squadrons of the Heavies. “They don’t know their minds from one minute to the next. I tell ye, Flash, that ould ninny Raglan will hinder the cavalry at all costs – an’ Lucan’s not a whit better. What do they think horse-soldiers are for? Well, Lucan shall have his order, and be damned to them!”

I eased up as we shot through the ranks of the Greys, letting him go ahead; he went streaking through the Heavies, and across the intervening space towards the Lights. I’d no wish to be dragged into the discussion that would inevitably ensue with Lucan, who had to have every order explained to him three times at least. But I supposed I ought to be on hand, so I cantered easily up to the 4th Lights, and there was George Paget again, wanting to know what was up.

“You’re advancing shortly,” says I, and “Damned high time, too,” says he. “Got a cheroot, Flash? – I haven’t a weed to my name.”

I gave him one, and he squinted at me. “You’re looking peaky,” says he. “Anything wrong?”

“Bowels,” says I. “Damn all Russian champagne. Where’s Lord Look-on?”

He pointed, and I saw Lucan out ahead of the Lights, with some galloper beside him, and Nolan just reining up. Lew was saluting, and handing him the paper, and while Lucan pored over it I looked about me.

It was drowsy and close down here on the plain after the breezy heights of the Sapoune; hardly a breath of wind, and the flies buzzing round the horses’ heads, and the heavy smell of dung and leather. I suddenly realized I was damned tired, and my belly wouldn’t lie quiet again; I grunted in reply to George’s questions, and took stock of the Brigade, squirming uncomfortably in my saddle – there were the Cherrypickers in front, all very spruce in blue and pink with their pelisses trailing; to their right the mortar-board helmets and blue tunics of the 17th, with their lances at rest and the little red point plumes hanging limp; to their right again, not far from where Lucan was sitting, the 13th Lights, with the great Lord Cardigan himself out to the fore, sitting very aloof and alone and affecting not to notice Lucan and Nolan, who weren’t above twenty yards from him.

Suddenly I was aware of Lucan’s voice raised, and trotted away from George in that direction; it looked as though Lew would need some help in getting the message into his lordship’s thick skull. I saw Lucan look in my direction, and just at that moment, as I was passing the 17th, someone called out:

“Hollo, there’s old Flashy! Now we’ll see some fun! What’s the row, Flash?”

This sort of thing happens when one is generally admired; I replied with a nonchalant wave of the hand, and sang out: “Tally-ho, you fellows! You’ll have all the fun you want presently,” at which they laughed, and I saw Tubby Morris grinning across at me.

And then I heard Lucan’s voice, clear as a bugle. “Guns, sir? What guns, may I ask? I can see no guns.”

He was looking up the valley, his hand shading his eyes, and when I looked, by God, you couldn’t see the redoubt where the Ruskis had been limbering up to haul the guns away – just the long slope of Causeway Heights, and the Russian infantry uncomfortably close.

“Where, sir?” cries Lucan. “What guns do you mean?”

I could see Lew’s face working; he was scarlet with fury, and his hand was shaking as he came up by Lucan’s shoulder, pointing along the line of the Causeway.

“There, my lord – there, you see, are the guns! There’s your enemy!”

He brayed it out, as though he was addressing a dirty trooper, and Lucan stiffened as though he’d been hit. He looked as though he would lose his temper, but then he commanded himself, and Lew wheeled abruptly away and cantered off, making straight for me where I was sitting to the right of the 17th. He was shaking with passion, and as he drew abreast of me he rasped out:

“The bloody fool! Does he want to sit on his great fat arse all day and every day?”

“Lew,” says I, pretty sharp, “did you tell him he was to act defensively and at his own discretion?”

“Tell him?” says he, bearing his teeth in a savage grin. “By Christ, I told him three times over! As if that bastard needs telling to act defensively – he’s capable of nothing else! Well, he’s got his bloody orders – now let’s see how he carries them out!”

And with that he went over to Tubby Morris, and I thought, well, that’s that – now for the Sapoune, home and beauty, and let ’em chase to their hearts content down here. And I was just wheeling my horse, when from behind me I heard Lucan’s voice.

“Colonel Flashman!” He was sitting with Cardigan, before the 13th Lights. “Come over here, if you please!”

Now what, thinks I, and my belly gave a great windy twinge as I trotted over towards them. Lucan was snapping at him impatiently, as I drew alongside:

“I know, I know, but there it is. Lord Raglan’s order is quite positive, and we must obey it.”

“Oh, vewy well,” says Cardigan, damned ill-humoured; his voice was a mere croak, no doubt with his roupy chest, or over-boozing on his yacht. He flicked a glance at me, and looked away, sniffing; Lucan addressed me.

“You will accompany Lord Cardigan,” says he. “In the event that communication is needed, he must have a galloper.”

I stared horrified, hardly taking in Cardigan’s comment: “I envisage no necessity for Colonel Fwashman’s pwesence, or for communication with your lordship.”

“Indeed, sir,” says I, “Lord Raglan will need me … I dare not wait any longer … with your lordship’s permission, I –”

“You will do as I say!” barks Lucan. “Upon my word, I have never met such insolence from mere gallopers before this day! First Nolan, and now you! Do as you are told, sir, and let us have none of this shirking!”

And with that he wheeled away, leaving me terrified, enraged, and baffled. What could I do? I couldn’t disobey – it just wasn’t possible. He had said I must ride with Cardigan, to those damned redoubts, chasing Raglan’s bloody guns – my God, after what I had been through already! In an instant, by pure chance, I’d been snatched from security and thrust into the melting-pot again – it wouldn’t do. I turned to Cardigan – the last man I’d have appealed to, in any circumstances, except an extremity like this.

“My lord,” says I. “This is preposterous – unreasonable! Lord Raglan will need me! Will you speak to his lordship – he must be made to see –”

“If there is one thing,” says Cardigan, in that croaking drawl, “of which I am tolewably certain in this uncertain world, it is the total impossibiwity of making my Word Wucan see anything at all. He makes it cwear, furthermore, that there is no discussion of his orders.” He looked me up and down. “You heard him, sir. Take station behind me, and to my weft. Bewieve me, I do not welcome your pwesence here any more than you do yourself.”

At that moment, up came George Paget, my cheroot clamped between his teeth.

“We are to advance, Lord George,” says Cardigan. “I shall need close support, do you hear? – your vewy best support, Lord George. Haw-haw. You understand me?”

George took the cheroot from his mouth, looked at it, stuck it back, and then said, very stiff: “As always, my lord, you shall have my support.”

“Haw-haw. Vewy well,” says Cardigan, and they turned aside, leaving me stricken, and nicely hoist with my own petard, you’ll agree. Why hadn’t I kept my mouth shut in Raglan’s presence? I could have been safe and comfy up on the Sapoune – but no, I’d had to try to vent my spite, to get Cardigan in the way of a bullet, and the result was I would be facing the bullets alongside him. Oh, a skirmish round gun redoubts is a small enough thing by military standards – unless you happen to be taking part in it, and I reckoned I’d used up two of my nine lives today already. To make matters worse, my stomach was beginning to churn and heave most horribly again; I sat there, with my back to the Light Brigade, nursing it miserably, while behind me the orders rattled out, and the squadrons reformed; I took a glance round and saw the 17th were now directly behind me, two little clumps of lances, with the Cherrypickers in behind. And here came Cardigan, trotting out in front, glancing back at the silent squadrons.

He paused, facing them, and there was no sound now but the restless thump of hooves, and the creak and jingle of the gear. All was still, five regiments of cavalry, looking down the valley, with Flashy out in front, wishing he were dead and suddenly aware that dreadful things were happening under his belt. I moved, gasping gently to myself, stirring on my saddle, and suddenly, without the slightest volition on my part, there was the most crashing discharge of wind, like the report of a mortar. My horse started; Cardigan jumped in his saddle, glaring at me, and from the ranks of the 17th a voice muttered: “Christ, as if Russian artillery wasn’t bad enough!” Someone giggled, and another voice said: “We’ve ’ad Whistlin’ Dick – now we got Trumpetin’ Harry an’ all!”

“Silence!” cries Cardigan, looking like thunder, and the murmur in the ranks died away. And then, God help me, in spite of my straining efforts to contain myself, there was another fearful bang beneath me, echoing off the saddle, and I thought Cardigan would explode with fury.

I could not merely sit there. “I beg your pardon, my lord,” says I, “I am not well –”

“Be silent!” snaps he, and he must have been in a highly nervous condition himself, otherwise he would never have added, in a hoarse whisper:

“Can you not contain yourself, you disgusting fellow?”

“My lord,” whispers I, “I cannot help it – it is the feverish wind, you see –” and I interrupted myself yet again, thunderously. He let out a fearful oath, under his breath, and wheeled his charger, his hand raised; he croaked out “Bwigade will advance – first squadron, 17th – walk-march – twot!” and behind us the squadrons stirred and moved forward, seven hundred cavalry, one of them palsied with fear but in spite of that feeling a mighty relief internally – it was what I had needed all day, of course, like those sheep that stuff themselves on some windy weed, and have to be pierced to get them right again.

And that was how it began. Ahead of me I could see the short turf of the valley turning to plough, and beyond that the haze at the valley end, a mile and more away, and only a few hundred yards off, on either side, the enclosing slopes, with the small figures of Russian infantry clearly visible. You could even see their artillerymen wheeling the guns round, and scurrying among the limbers – we were well within range, but they were watching, waiting to see what we would do next. I forced myself to look straight ahead down the valley; there were guns there in plenty, and squadrons of Cossacks flanking them; their lance points and sabres caught the sun and threw it back in a thousand sudden gleams of light. Would they try a charge when we wheeled right towards the redoubts? Would Cardigan deploy the 4th Lights? Would he put the 17th forward as a screen when we made our flank movement? If I stuck close by him, would I be all right? Oh, God, how had I landed in this fix again – three times in a day? It wasn’t fair – it was unnatural, and then my innards spoke again, resoundingly, and perhaps the Russian gunners heard it, for far down the Causeway on the right a plume of smoke blossomed out as though in reply, there was the crash of the discharge and the shot went screaming overhead, and then from all along the Causeway burst out a positive salvo of firing; there was an orange flash and a huge bang a hundred paces ahead, and a fount of earth was hurled up and came pattering down before us, while behind there was the crash of exploding shells, and a new barrage opening up from the hills on the left.

Suddenly it was, as Lord Tennyson tells us, like the very jaws of hell; I realized that, without noticing, I had started to canter, babbling gently to myself, and in front Cardigan was cantering too, but not as fast as I was (one celebrated account remarks that, “In his eagerness to be first at grips with the foe, Flashman was seen to forge ahead; ah, we can guess the fierce spirit that burned in that manly breast” – I don’t know about that, but I’m here to inform you that it was nothing to the fierce spirit that burned in my manly bowels). There was a crash-crash-crash of flaming bursts across the front, and the scream of shell splinters whistling by; Cardigan shouted “Steady!”, but his own charger was pacing away now, and behind me the clatter and jingle was being drowned by the rising drum of hooves, from a slow canter to a fast one, and then to a slow gallop, and I tried to rein in that little mare, smothering my own panic, and snarling fiercely to myself: “Wheel, wheel, for God’s sake! Why doesn’t the stupid bastard wheel?” For we were level with the first Russian redoubt; their guns were levelled straight at us, not four hundred yards away, the ground ahead was being torn up by shot, and then from behind me there was a frantic shout.

I turned in the saddle, and there was Nolan, his sabre out, charging across behind me, shouting hoarsely, “Wheel, my lord! Not that way! Wheel – to the redoubts!” His voice was all but drowned in the tumult of explosion, and then he was streaking past Cardigan, reining his beast back on its haunches, his face livid as he turned to face the brigade. He flourished his sabre, and shouted again, and a shell seemed to explode dead in front of Cardigan’s horse; for a moment I lost Nolan in the smoke, and then I saw him, face contorted in agony, his tunic torn open and gushing blood from shoulder to waist. He shrieked horribly, and his horse came bounding back towards us, swerving past Cardigan with Lew toppling forward on to the neck of his mount. As I stared back, horrified, I saw him careering into the gap between the Lancers and the 13th Light, and then they had swallowed him, and the squadrons came surging down towards me.

I turned to look for Cardigan; he was thirty yards ahead, tugging like damnation to hold his charger in, with the shot crashing all about him. “Stop!” I screamed. “Stop! For Christ’s sake, man, rein in!” For now I saw what Lew had seen – the fool was never going to wheel, he was taking the Light Brigade straight into the heart of the Russian army, towards those massive batteries at the valley foot, that were already belching at us, while the cannon on either side were raking us from the flanks, trapping us in a terrible enfilade that must smash the whole command to pieces.

“Stop, damn you!” I yelled again, and was in the act of wheeling to shout at the squadrons behind when the earth seemed to open beneath me in a sheet of orange flame; I reeled in the saddle, deafened, the horse staggered, went down, and recovered, with myself clinging for dear life, and then I was grasping nothing but loose reins. The bridle was half gone, my brute had a livid gash spouting blood along her neck; she screamed and hurtled madly forward, and I seized the mane to prevent myself being thrown from the saddle.

Suddenly I was level with Cardigan; we bawled at each other, he waving his sabre, and now there were blue tunics level with me, either side, and the lance points of the 17th were thrusting forward, with the men crouched low in the saddles. It was an inferno of bursting shell and whistling fragments, of orange flame and choking smoke; a trooper alongside me was plucked from his saddle as though by an invisible hand, and I found myself drenched in a shower of blood. My little mare went surging ahead, crazy with pain; we were outdistancing Cardigan now – and even in that hell of death and gunfire, I remember, my stomach was asserting itself again, and I rode yelling with panic and farting furiously at the same time. I couldn’t hold my horse at all; it was all I could do to stay aboard as we raced onwards, and as I stared wildly ahead I saw that we were a bare few hundred yards from the Russian batteries. The great black muzzles were staring me in the face, smoke wreathing up around them, but even as I saw the flame belching from them I couldn’t hear the crash of their discharge – it was all lost in the fearful continuous reverberating cannonade that surrounded us. There was no stopping my mad career, and I found myself roaring pleas for mercy to the distant Russian gunners, crying stop, stop, for God’s sake, cease fire, damn you, and let me alone. I could see them plainly, crouching at their breeches, working furiously to reload and pour another torrent of death at us through the smoke; I raged and swore mindlessly at them, and dragged out my sabre, thinking, by heaven, if you finish me I’ll do my damndest to take one of you with me, you filthy Russian scum. (“And then,” wrote that fatuous ass of a correspondent, “was seen with what nobility and power the gallant Flashman rode. Charging ahead even of his valiant chief, the death cry of the illustrious Nolan in his ears, his eye flashing terribly as he swung the sabre that had stemmed the horde at Jallalabad, he hurtled against the foe.”) Well, yes, you might put it that way, but my nobility and power was concentrated, in a moment of inspiration, in trying to swerve that maddened beast out of the fixed lines of the guns; I had just sense enough left for that. I tugged at the mane with my free hand, she swerved and stumbled, recovered, reared, and had me half out of the saddle; my innards were seized with a fresh spasm, and if I were a fanciful man I’d swear I blew myself back astride of her. The ground shook beneath us with another exploding shell, knocking us sideways; I clung on, sobbing, and as the smoke cleared Cardigan came thundering by, sabre thrust out ahead of his charger’s ears, and I heard him hoarsely shouting:

“Steady them! Hold them in! Cwose up and hold in!”

I tried to yell to him to halt, that he was going the wrong way, but my voice seemed to have gone. I turned in the saddle to shout or signal the men behind, and my God, what a sight it was! Half a dozen riderless horses at my very tail, crazy with fear, and behind them a score – God knows there didn’t seem to be any more – of the 17th Lancers, some with hats gone, some streaked with blood, strung out any old how, glaring like madmen and tearing along. Empty saddles, shattered squadrons, all order gone, men and beasts going down by the second, the ground furrowing and spouting earth even as you watched – and still they came on, the lances of the 17th, and behind the sabres of the 11th – just a fleeting instant’s thought I had, even in that inferno, remembering the brilliant Cherrypickers in splendid review, and there they were tearing forward like a horde of hell-bound spectres.

I had only a moment to look back – my mare was galloping like a thing demented, and as I steadied, there was Cardigan, waving his sabre and standing in his stirrups; the guns were only a hundred yards away, almost hidden in a great billowing bank of smoke, a bank which kept glaring red as though some Lucifer were opening furnace doors deep inside it. There was no turning, no holding back, and even in that deafening thunder I could hear the sudden chorus of yells behind me as the torn remnant of the Light Brigade gathered itself for the final mad charge into the battery. I dug in my heels, yelling nonsense and brandishing my sabre, shot into the smoke with one final rip from my bowels and a prayer that my gallant little mare wouldn’t career headlong into a gun-muzzle, staggered at the fearful concussion of a gun exploding within a yard of me – and then we were through, into the open space behind the guns, leaping the limbers and ammunition boxes with the Russians scattering to let us through, and Cardigan a bare two yards away, reining his beast back almost on its haunches.

And then for a moment everything seemed to happen very slowly. I can see it all so distinctly: immediately to my left, and close enough to toss a biscuit, there was a squadron of Cossacks, with their lances couched, but all immobile, staring as though in amazement. Almost under my mare’s hooves there was a Russian gunner, clutching a rammer, sprawling to get out of the way – he was stripped to the waist, I remember, and had a medal round his neck on a string – ahead of me, perhaps fifty yards off, was a brilliant little group of mounted men who could only be staff officers, and right beside me, still stiff and upright as a lance at rest, was Cardigan – by God, I thought, you’re through that without a scratch on you, damn you! And so, it crossed my mind, was I – for the moment. And then everything jerked into crazy speed again, as the Light Brigade came careering out of the smoke, and the whole battery was suddenly a melee of rearing beasts, yelling maniacs, cracking pieces and flashing steel.

I was in the final moments of Little Big Horn, and the horror of Chillianwallah, which are among my nastiest recollections still, but for sheer murderous fury I recall nothing like the mad few minutes when the battered rabble of the Light Brigade rode over that Russian battery. It was as though they had gone mad – which, in a sense, they had. They slashed those Russian gun-crews apart, sabring, lancing, pounding them down under-hoof – I saw a corporal of the 17th drive his lance point four feet through a gunner’s body and then leap from the saddle to tear at the fellow with his hands, Cardigan exchanging cuts with a mounted officer, troopers wrestling with Cossacks in the saddle, one of our Hussars on foot, whirling his sabre round his head and driving into a crowd of half a dozen, a Russian with his arm off at the elbow and a trooper still sabring him about the head – and then a Cossack came lumbering at me, roaring, with his lance couched to drive me through, but he was a handless clown, and missed me by a yard. I howled and slashed him back-handed as he blundered by, and then I was buffeted clean out of the saddle and went rolling away, weaponless, beneath a gun limber.

If I hadn’t been scared witless I dare say I’d have stayed where I was, meditating, getting rid of some more wind, and generally taking a detached view, but in my panic I came scurrying out again, and there was George Paget, of all people, leaning from his saddle to grab my arm and swing me towards a riderless horse. I scrambled up, and George shouted:

“Come on, Flash, you old savage – we can’t lose you! I’ll want another of your cheroots presently!¹⁹ Close here, 4th Lights! Clo-o-o-se!”

There was a swirl of troopers round us, glaring smoke-blackened, bloody faces, a volley of commands, someone thrust a sabre into my hand, and George was crying:

“What a bloody pickle! We must cut our way home! Follow me!” and off we pounded, gasping and blinded, at his heels. I must have been near stupid with panic, for all I could think was: one more rush, just one more, and we’ll be out of this hell-hole and back into the valley – God knows that was a horrifying prospect enough, but at least we were riding in the right direction, and providence or something had been on my side so far, and if only my luck would hold I might come through and reach the Sapoune and the camp beyond it and my bed and a ship and London and never, never go near a bloody uniform again –

“Halt!” bawls George, and I thought, I don’t care, this is one gallant cavalryman who isn’t halting for anything, I’ve had enough, and if I’m the only man who goes streaking back up that valley, leaving his comrades in the lurch, to hell with it. I put my head down and my heels in, thrust out my sabre to discourage any fool who got in the way, and charged ahead for all I was worth.

I heard George bawling behind me: “Halt! No, Flash, no!” and thought, carry on, George, and be damned to you. I fairly flew over the turf, the shouting died behind me, and I raised my head and looked – straight at what appeared to be the entire Russian army, drawn up in review order. There were great hideous ranks of the brutes, with Cossacks dead ahead, not twenty yards off – I had only a fleeting glimpse of amazed, bearded faces, there wasn’t a hope of stopping, and then with a blasphemous yell of despair I plunged into them, horse, sabre and all.

“Picture, if you can bear it, reader” – as that idiot journalist put it – “the agony of Lord George Paget and his gallant remnant, in that moment. They had fought like heroes in the battery, Lord George himself had plucked the noble Flashman from bloody hand-to-hand conflict, they had rallied and ridden on through the battery, Lord George had given the halt, preparatory to wheeling about and charging back into the battery and the valley beyond, where ultimate safety lay – picture then, their anguish, when that great heart, too full to think of safety, or of aught but the cruel destruction of so many of his comrades, chose instead to launch himself alone against the embattled ranks of Muscovy! Sabre aloft, proud defiance on his lips, he chose the course that honour pointed, and rode like some champion of old to find death on the sabres of his enemies.”

Well, I’ve always said, if you get the Press on your side you’re half way there. I’ve never bothered to correct that glowing tribute, until now; it seems almost a shame to do it at last. I don’t remember which journal it appeared in – Bell’s Sporting Life, for all I know – but I don’t doubt it caused many a manly tear to start, and many a fair bosom to heave when they read it. In the meantime, I was doing a bit in the manly tear and bosom-heaving line myself, with my horse foundering under me, my sabre flying from my hand, and my sorely-tried carcase sprawling on the turf while all those peasant horsemen shied back, growling and gaping, and then closed in again, staring down at me in that dull, astonished way that Russians have. I just lay there, gasping like a salmon on the bank, waiting for the lance-points to come skewering down on me, and babbling weakly:

“Kamerad! Ami! Sarte! Amigo! Oh God, what’s the Russian for ‘friend’?”

Being a prisoner of war has its advantages, or used to. If you were a British officer, taken by a civilized foe, you could expect to be rather better treated than your adversary would treat his own people; he would use you as a guest, entertain you, be friendly, and not bother overmuch about confining you. He might ask your parole not to try to escape, but not usually – since you would be exchanged for one of his own people at the first opportunity there wasn’t much point in running off.

Mind you, I think we British fared rather better than most. They respected us, and knew we didn’t make war in a beastly fashion, like these Balkan fellows, so they treated us accordingly. But a Russian taken by the Poles, or an Austrian by the Eyetyes, or even a Confederate by the Yankees – well, he might not come off quite so comfortably. I’m told it’s all changing now, and that war’s no longer a gentleman’s game (as though it ever was), and that among the “new professionals” a prisoner’s a prisoner so damned well cage him up. I don’t know: we treated each other decently, and weren’t one jot more incompetent than this Sandhurst-and-Shop crowd. Look at that young pup Kitchener – what that fellow needs is a woman or two.

At all events, no one has ever treated me better, by and large, than the Russians did, although I don’t think it was kindness, but ignorance. From the moment I measured my length among those Cossacks, I found myself being regarded with something like awe. It wasn’t just the Light Brigade fiasco, which had impressed them tremendously, but a genuine uncertainty where the English were concerned – they seemed to look on us as though we were men from the moon, or made of dynamite and so liable to go off if scratched. The truth is, they’re such a dull, wary lot of peasants – the ordinary folk and soldiers, that is – that they go in fear of anything strange until someone tells ’em what to do about it. In those days, of course, most of them were slaves – except for the Cossacks - and behaved as such.

I’ll have more to say about this, but for the moment it’s enough to note that the Cossacks kept away from me, glowering, until one of their officers jumped down, helped me to my feet, and accepted my surrender. I doubt if he understood a word I said, for I was too shocked and confused to be coherent, even if I’d spoken Russian, which I didn’t much, at that time. He led me through the crowd, and once I had realized that they weren’t going to do me violence, and that I was safely out of that hellish maelstrom, I set myself to collect my wits and consider what should be done.

They stuck me in a tent, with two massive Cossacks at the entrance – Black Sea Cossacks, as I learned later, with those stringy long-haired caps, and scarlet lances – and there I sat, listening to the growing chatter outside, and every now and then an officer would stick his face in, and regard me, and then withdraw. I was still feeling fearfully sick and giddy, and my right ear seemed to have gone deaf with the cannonading, but as I leaned against the pole, shuddering, one thought kept crowding gloriously into my mind: I was alive, and in one piece. I’d survived, God knew how, the shattering of the Light Brigade, to say nothing of the earlier actions of the day – it seemed like a year since I’d stood with Campbell’s Highlanders, though it was a bare five hours ago. You’ve come through again, my boy, I kept thinking; you’re going to live. That being the case, head up, look alive and keep your eyes open.

Presently in came a little dapper chap in a fine white uniform, black boots, and a helmet with a crowned eagle. “Lanskey,” says he, in good French – which most educated Russians spoke, by the way – “Major, Cuirassiers of the Guard. Whom have I the pleasure of addressing?”

“Flashman,” says I, “Colonel, 17th Lancers.”

“Enchanted,” says he, bowing. “May I request that you accompany me to General Liprandi, who is most anxious to make the acquaintance of such a distinguished and gallant officer?”

Well, he couldn’t have said fairer; I bucked up at once, and he led me out, through a curious throng of officers and staff hangers-on, into a great tent where about a dozen senior officers were waiting, with a genial-looking, dark-whiskered fellow in a splendid sable coat, whom I took to be Liprandi, seated behind a table. They stopped talking at once; a dozen pairs of eager eyes fixed on me as Lanskey presented me, and I stood up tall, ragged and muck-smeared though I was, and just stared over Liprandi’s head, clicking my heels.

He came round the table, right up to me, and said, also in excellent French: “Your pardon, colonel. Permit me.” And to my astonishment he stuck his nose up close to my lips, sniffing.

“What the devil?” cries I, stepping back.

“A thousand pardons, sir,” says he. “It is true, gentlemen,” turning to his staff. “Not a suspicion of liquor.” And they all began to buzz again, staring at me.

“You are perfectly sober,” says Liprandi. “And so, as I have ascertained, are your troopers who have been taken prisoner. I confess, I am astonished.²⁰ Will you perhaps enlighten us, colonel, what was the explanation of that … that extraordinary action by your light cavalry an hour ago? Believe me,” he went on, “I seek no military intelligence from you – no advantage of information. But it is beyond precedent – beyond understanding. Why, in God’s name, did you do it?”

Now, I didn’t know, at that time, precisely what we had done. I guessed we must have lost three-quarters of the Light Brigade, by a hideous mistake, but I couldn’t know that I’d just taken part in the most famous cavalry action ever fought, one that was to sound round the world, and that even eye-witnesses could scarcely believe. The Russians were amazed; it seemed to them we must have been drunk, or drugged, or mad – they weren’t to guess that it had been a ghastly accident. And I wasn’t going to enlighten them. So I said:

“Ah, well, you know, it was just to teach you fellows to keep your distance.”

At this they exclaimed, and shook their heads and swore, and Liprandi looked bewildered, and kept muttering: “Five hundred sabres! To what end?”, and they crowded round, plying me with questions – all very friendly, mind, so that I began to get my bounce back, and played it off as though it were just another day’s work. What they couldn’t fathom was how we’d held together all the way to the guns, and hadn’t broken or turned back, even with four saddles empty out of five, so I just told ’em, “We’re British cavalry,” simple as that, and looked them in the eye. It was true, too, even if no one had less right to say it than I.

At that they stamped and swore again, incredulously, and one huge chap with a beard began to weep, and insisted on embracing me, stinking of garlic as he was, and Liprandi called for brandy, and demanded of me what we, in English, called our light cavalry, and when I told him they all raised their glasses and shouted together: “Thee Light Brigedde!” and dashed down their glasses and ground them underfoot, and embraced me again, laughing and shouting and patting me on the head, while I, the unworthy recipient, looked pretty bluff and offhand and said, no, dammit all, it was nothing, just our usual form, don’t you know. (I should have felt shame, doubtless, at the thought that I, old windy Harry, was getting the plaudits and the glory, but you know me. Anyway, I’d been there, hadn’t I, all the way; should I be disqualified, just because I was babbling scared?)

After that it was all booze and good fellowship, and when I’d been washed and given a change of clothes Liprandi gave me a slap-up dinner with his staff, and the champagne flowed – French, you may be certain; these Russians know how to go to war – and they were all full of attention and admiration and a thousand questions, but every now and then they would fall silent and look at me in that strange way that every survivor of the charge has come to recognize: respectfully, and almost with reverence, but with a hint of suspicion, as though you weren’t quite canny.

Indeed their hospitality was so fine, that night, that I began to feel regretful at the thought that I’d probably be exchanged in the next day or two, and would find myself back in that lousy, fever-ridden camp under Sevastopol – it’s a curious thing, but my belly, which had been in such wicked condition all day, felt right as rain after that dinner. We all got gloriously tight, drinking healths, and the bearded garlic giant and Lanskey carried me to bed, and we all fell on the floor, roaring and laughing. As I crawled on to my blankets I had only a moment’s blurred recollection of the sound of cannonade, and ranks of Highlanders, and Scarlett’s gaudy scarf, and the headlong gallop down the Sapoune, and Cardigan cantering slowly and erect, and those belching guns, all whirling together in a great smoky confusion. And it all seemed past and unimportant as I slid away into unconsciousness and slept like a winter hedgehog.

They didn’t exchange me. They kept me for a couple of weeks, confined in a cottage at Yalta, with two musketmen on the door and a Russian colonel of Horse Pioneers to walk the little garden with me for exercise, and then I was visited by Radziwill, a very decent chap on Liprandi’s staff who spoke English and knew London well. He was terribly apologetic, explaining that there wasn’t a suitable exchange, since I was a staff man, and a pretty rare catch. I didn’t believe this; we’d taken senior Russian officers every bit as important as I, at the Alma, and I wondered exactly why they wanted to keep me prisoner, but there was no way of finding out, of course. Not that it concerned me much – I didn’t mind a holiday in Russia, being treated as an honoured guest rather than a prisoner, for Radziwill hastened to reassure me that what they intended to do was send me across the Crimea to Kertch, and then by boat to mainland Russia, where I’d be safely tucked away on a country estate. The advantage of this was that I would be so far out of harm’s way that escape would be impossible – I tried to look serious and knowing when he said this, as though I’d been contemplating running off to rejoin the bloody battle again – and I could lead a nice easy life without over-many restrictions, until the war was over, which couldn’t be long, anyway.

I’ve learned to make the best of things, so I accepted without demur, packed up my few traps, which consisted of my cleaned and mended Lancer blues and a few shirts and things which Radziwill gave me, and prepared to go where I was taken. I was quite looking forward to it – fool that I was.

Before I went, Radziwill – no doubt meaning to be kind, but in fact just being an infernal nuisance – arranged for me to visit those survivors of the Light Brigade who’d been taken prisoner, and were in confinement down near Yalta. I didn’t want to see them, much, but I couldn’t refuse.

There were about thirty of them in a big stuffy shed, and not above six of them unwounded. The others were in cots, with bandaged heads and slings, some with limbs off, lying like wax dummies, one or two plainly just waiting to die, and all of them looking desperate hangdog. The moment I went inside I wished I hadn’t come – it’s this kind of thing, the stale smell of blood, the wasted faces, the hushed voices, the awful hopeless tiredness, that makes you understand what a hellish thing war is. Worse than a battle-field, worse than the blood and the mud and the smoke and the steel, is the dank misery of a hospital of wounded men – and this place was a good deal better than most. Russians ain’t clean, by any means, but the ward they’d made for our fellows was better than our own medical folk could have arranged at Balaclava.

Would you believe it, when I came in they raised a cheer? The pale faces lit up, those that could struggled upright in bed, and their non-com, who wasn’t wounded, threw me a salute.

“Ryan, sir,” says he. “Troop sergeant-major, Eighth ’Ussars. Sorry to see you’re took, sir – but glad to see you well.”

I thanked him, and shook hands, and then went round, giving a word here and there, as you’re bound to do, and feeling sick at the sight of the pain and disfigurement – it could have been me, lying there with a leg off, or my face stitched like a football.

“Not takin’ any ’arm, sir, as you see,” says Ryan. “The grub ain’t much, but it fills. You’re bein’ treated proper yourself, sir, if I may make so bold? That’s good, that is; I’m glad to ’ear that. You’ll be gettin’ exchanged, I reckon? No – well, blow me! Who’d ha’ thought that? I reckon they doesn’t want to let you go, though – why, when we heard t’other day as you’d been took, old Dick there – that’s ’im, sir, wi’ the sabre-cut – ’e says: ‘That’s good noos for the Ruskis; ole Flashy’s worth a squadron any day’ – beggin’ yer pardon, sir.”

“That’s mighty kind of friend Dick,” says I, “but I fear I’m not worth very much at present, you know.”

They laughed – such a thin laugh – and growled and said “Garn!”, and Ryan dropped his voice, glancing towards where Lanskey loitered by the door, and says softly:

“I knows better, sir. An’ there’s ’arf a dozen of us sound enough ’ere to be worth twenty o’ these Ruski chaps. If you was to say the word, sir, I reckon we could break our way out of ’ere, grab a few sabres, an’ cut our way back to th’Army! It can’t be above twenty mile to Sevasto-pool! We could do it, sir! The boys is game fer it, an’–”

“Silence, Ryan!” says I. “I won’t hear of it.” This was one of these dangerous bastards, I could see, full of duty and desperate notions. “What, break away and leave our wounded comrades? No, no, that would never do – I’m surprised at you.”

He flushed. “I’m sorry, sir; I was just –”

“I know, my boy.” I put a hand on his shoulder. “You want to do your duty, as a soldier should. But, you see, it can’t be. And you can take pride in what you have done already – all of you can.” I thought a few patriotic words wouldn’t do any harm. “You are stout fellows, all of you. England is proud of you.” And will let you go to the poor-house, in time, or sell laces at street corners, I thought to myself.

“Ole Jim the Bear’ll be proud, an’ all,” pipes up one chap with a bandage swathing his head and eye, and I saw the blood-stained Cherrypicker pants at the foot of his cot. “They do say as ’is Lordship got out the battery, sir. Dryden there was picked up by the Ruskis in the valley, an’ ’e saw Lord Cardigan goin’ back arterwards – says ’e ’ad a bloody sabre, too, but wasn’t hurt ’isself.”

That was bad news; I could have borne the loss of Cardigan any day.

“Good ole Jim!”

“Ain’t ’e the one, though!”

“’E’s a good ole commander, an’ a gentleman, even if ’e is an 11th ’Ussar!” says Ryan, and they all laughed, and looked shy at me, because they knew I’d been a Cherrypicker, once.

There was a very pale, thin young face in the cot nearest the door, and as I was turning away, he croaked out, in a little whisper:

“Colonel Flashman, sir – Troop sarn’t major was sayin’ – it never ’appened afore – cavalry, chargin’ a battery wi’ no support, an’ takin’ it. Never ’appened nowheres, in any war, sir. Is that right, sir?”

I didn’t know, but I’d certainly never heard of it. So I said, “I believe that’s right. I think it may be.”

He smiled. “That’s good, then. Thank’ee, sir.” And he lay back, with his eyelids twitching, breathing very quietly.

“Well,” says I. “Good-bye, Ryan. Good-bye, all of you. Ah – keep your spirits up. We’ll all be going home soon.”

“When the Ruskis is beat,” cries someone, and Ryan says:

“Three cheers for the Colonel!” and they all cheered, feebly, and shouted “Good old Flash Harry!” and the man with the patched eye began to sing, and they all took it up, and as I drove off with Lanskey I heard the words of the old Light Brigade canter fading behind me:

In the place of water we’ll drink ale,

An’ pay no reck’ning on the nail,

No man for debt shall go to jail,

While he can Garryowen hail.

I’ve heard it from Afghanistan to Whitehall, from the African veldt to drunken hunting parties in Rutland; heard it sounded on penny whistles by children and roared out in full-throated chorus by Custer’s 7th on the day of Greasy Grass – and there were survivors of the Light Brigade singing on that day, too – but it always sounds bitter on my ears, because I think of those brave, deluded, pathetic bloody fools in that Russian shed, with their mangled bodies and lost limbs, all for a shilling a day and a pauper’s grave – and yet they thought Cardigan, who’d have flogged ’em for a rusty spur and would see them murdered under the Russian guns because he hadn’t wit and manhood enough to tell Lucan to take his order to hell – they thought he was “a good old commander”, and they even cheered me, who’d have turned tail on them at the click of a bolt. Mind you, I’m harmless, by comparison – I don’t send ’em off, stuffed with lies and rubbish, to get killed and maimed for nothing except a politician’s vanity or a manufacturer’s profit. Oh, I’ll sham it with the best in public, and sport my tinware, but I know what I am, and there’s no room for honest pride in me, you see. But if there was – just for a little bit, along with the disgust and hatred and selfishness – I’d keep it for them, those seven hundred British sabres.

It must be the drink talking. That’s the worst of it; whenever I think back to Balaclava, there’s nothing for it but the booze. It’s not that I feel guilt or regret or shame – they don’t count beside feeling alive, anyway, even if I were capable of them. It’s just that I don’t really understand Balaclava, even now. Oh, I can understand, without sharing, most kinds of courage – that which springs from rage, or fear, or greed or even love. I’ve had a bit of them myself – anyone can show brave if his children or his woman are threatened. (Mind you, if the hosts of Midian were assailing my little nest, offering to ravish my loved one, my line would be to say to her, look, you jolly ’em along, old girl, and look your best, while I circle round to a convenient rock with my rifle.) But are these emotions, that come of anger or terror or desire, really bravery at all? I doubt it, myself – but what happened in the North Valley, under those Russian guns, all for nothing, that’s bravery, and you may take the word of a true-blue coward for it. It’s beyond my ken, anyway, thank God, so I’ll say no more of it, or of Balaclava, which as far as my Russian adventure is concerned, was really just an unpleasant prelude. Enough’s enough; Lord Tennyson may have the floor for me.

The journey from Yalta through the woody hills to Kertch was not noteworthy; once you’ve seen a corner of the Crimea you’ve seen it all, and it’s not really Russia. From Kertch, where a singularly surly and uncommunicative French-speaking civilian took me in charge (with a couple of dragoons to remind me what I was), we went by sloop across the Azov Sea to Taganrog, a dirty little port, and joined the party of an imperial courier whose journey lay the same way as ours. Ah-ha, thinks I, we’ll travel in style, which shows how mistaken one can be.

We travelled in two telegues, which are just boxes on wheels, with a plank at the front for the driver, and straw or cushions for the passengers. The courier was evidently in no hurry, for we crawled along at an abominably slow pace, although telegues can travel at a tremendous clip when they want to, with a bell clanging in front, and everyone scattering out of their way. It always puzzled me, when I later saw the shocking condition of Russian roads, with their ruts and pot-holes, how the highways over which the telegues travelled were always smooth and level. The secret was this: telegues were used only by couriers and officials of importance, and before they came to a stretch of road, every peasant in the area was turned out to sand and level it.

So as we lumbered along, the courier in state in the first telegue, and Flashy with his escort in the second, there were always peasants standing by the roadside, men and women, in their belted smocks and ragged puttees, silent, unmoving, staring as we rolled by. This dull brooding watchfulness got on my nerves, especially at the post stations, where they used to assemble in silent groups to stare at us – they were so different from the Crim Tartars I had seen, who are lively, tall, well-made men, even if their women are seedy. The steppe Russians were much smaller, and ape-like by comparison.

Of course, what I didn’t realize then was that these people were slaves – real bound, European white slaves, which isn’t easy to understand until you see it. This wasn’t always so; it seems that Boris Godunov – whom most of you will know as a big fellow who takes about an hour and a half to die noisily in an opera – imposed serfdom on the Russian peasants, which meant that they became the property of the nobles and land-owners, who could buy and sell them, hire them out, starve them, lash them, imprison them, take their goods, beasts and womenfolk whenever they chose – in fact, do anything short of maiming them permanently or killing them. They did those things, too, of course, for I saw them, but it was officially unlawful.

The serfs were just like the nigger slaves in the States – worse off, if anything, for they didn’t seem to realize they were slaves. They looked on themselves as being attached to the soil (“we belong to the master, but the land is ours”, was a saying among them) and traditionally they had bits of land to work for their own benefit – three days on their patch each week, three on the master’s, was supposed to be the rule, but wherever I went it seemed to be six on the master’s and one for themselves, if they were lucky.

It may not seem possible to you that in Europe just forty years ago white folk could be used like this, that they could be flogged with rods and whips up to ten times a day, or knouted (which is something infinitely worse), or banished to Siberia for years at their landlord’s whim; all he had to do was pay the cost of their transportation. They could be made to wear spiked collars, the women could be kept in harems, the men could be drafted off to the army so that the owners could steal their wives without embarrassment, their children could be sold off – and in return for this they were meant to be grateful to their lords, and literally crawl in front of them, calling them “father”, touching their heads on the ground, and kissing their boots. I’ve watched them do it – just like political candidates at home. I’ve seen a lot of human sorrow and misery in my time, but the lot of the Russian serf was the most appalling I’ve ever struck.

Of course, it’s all changed now; they freed the serfs in ’61, just a few years after I was there, and now, I’m told, they are worse off than ever. Russia depended on slavery, you see, and when they freed them they upset the balance, and there was tremendous starvation and the economy went to blazes – well, in the old days the landlords had at least kept the serfs alive, for their own benefit, but after emancipation, why should they? And it was all nonsense, anyway; the Russians will always be slaves – so will most of the rest of mankind, of course, but it tends to be more obvious among the Ruskis.

For one thing, they look so damned slavish. I remember the first time I really noticed serfs, the first day’s drive out of Taganrog. It was at a little village post-station, where some official was thrashing a peasant – don’t know why – and this dull clown was just standing and letting himself be caned by a fellow half his size, hardly even wincing under the blows. There was a little crowd of serfs looking on, ugly, dirty-looking rascals in hairy blue smocks and rough trousers, with their women and a few ragged brats – and they were just watching, like cowed, stupid brutes. And when the little official finally broke his cane, and kicked the peasant and screamed at him to be off, the fellow just lumbered away, with the others trailing after him. It was as though they had no feeling whatever.

Oh, it was a cheery place, all right, this great empire of Russia as I first saw it in the autumn of ’54 – a great ill-worked wilderness ruled by a small landed aristocracy with their feet on the necks of a huge human-animal population, with Cossack devils keeping order when required. It was a brutal, backward place, for the rulers were ever fearful of the serfs, and held back everything educational or progressive – even the railway was discouraged, in case it should prove to be revolutionary – and with discontent everywhere, especially among those serfs who had managed to better themselves a little, and murmurings of revolt, the iron hand of government was pressing ever harder. The “white terror”, as they called the secret police, were everywhere; the whole population was on their books, and everyone had to have his “billet”, his “ticket to live” – without it you were nobody, you did not exist. Even the nobility feared the police, and it was from a landlord that I heard the Russian saying about being in jail – “Only there shall we sleep sound, for only there are we safe.”²¹

The land we travelled through was a fit place for such people – indeed, you have to see it to understand why they are what they are. I’ve seen big countries before – the American plains on the old wagon-trails west of St Louis, with the whispering grasses waving away and away to the very edge of the world, or the Saskatchewan prairies in grasshopper time, dun and empty under the biggest sky on earth. But Russia is bigger: there is no sky, only empty space overhead, and no horizon, only a distant haze, and endless miles of sun-scorched rank grass and emptiness. The few miserable hamlets, each with its rickety church, only seemed to emphasize the loneliness of that huge plain, imprisoning by its very emptiness – there are no hills for a man to climb into or to catch his imagination, nowhere to go: no wonder it binds its people to it.

It appalled me, as we rolled along, with nothing to do but strain your eyes for the next village, soaked by the rain or sweating in the sun, or sometimes huddling against the first wintry gusts that swept the steppes – they seemed to have all weathers together, and all bad. For amusement, of course, you could try to determine which stink was more offensive – the garlic chewed by the driver or the grease of his axles – or watch the shuttlecocks of the wind-witch plant being blown to and fro. I’ve known dreary, depressing journeys, but that was the limit; I’d sooner walk through Wales.

The truth is, I was beginning to find Russia a frightening place, with its brooding, brutish people and countryside to match; one began to lose the sense of space and time. The only reliefs were provided by our halts at the way-stations – poor, flea-ridden places with atrocious accommodation and worse food. You’d been able to get decent beef in the Crimea for a penny a pound, but here it was stchee and borsch, which are cabbage soups, horse-meat porridge, and sweet flour tarts, which were the only palatable things available. That, and their tea, kept me alive; the tea is good, provided you can get “caravan tea”, which is Chinese, and the best. The wine they may put back in the moujiks^a for me.

So my spirits continued to droop, but what shook them worst was an incident on the last morning of our journey when we had halted at a large village only thirty versts [twenty miles] from Starotorsk, the estate to which I was being sent. It wasn’t so different, really, from the peasant-thrashing I’d already seen, yet it, and the man involved, branded on my mind the knowledge of what a fearful, barbarous, sickeningly cruel land this Russia was.

The village lay on what seemed to be an important cross-roads; there was a river, I remember, and a military camp, and uniforms coming and going from the municipal building where my civilian took me to report my arrival – everything has to be reported to someone or other in Russia, in this case the local registrar, a surly, bull-necked brute in a grey tunic, who pawed over the papers, eyeing me nastily the while.

These Russian civil servants are a bad lot – pompous, stupid and rude at the best. They come in various grades, each with a military title – so that General or Colonel So-and-so turns out to be someone who neglects the parish sanitation or keeps inaccurate records of livestock. The brutes even wear medals, and are immensely puffed-up, and unless you bribe them lavishly they will cause you all the trouble they can.

I was waiting patiently, being eyed curiously by the officials and officers with whom the municipal hall was packed, and the registrar picked his teeth, scowling, and then launched into a great tirade in Russian – I gather it was addressed against all Englishmen in general and me in particular. He made it clear to my escort, and everyone else, that he considered it a gross waste of board and lodging that I should be housed at all – he’d have had me in the salt-mines for a stinking foreigner who had defiled the holy soil of Mother Russia – and so forth, until he got quite worked up, banging his desk and shouting and glaring, so that the noise and talk in the room died away as everyone stopped to listen.

It was just jack-in-office unpleasantness, and I had no choice but to ignore it. But someone else didn’t. One of the officers who had been standing to one side, chatting, suddenly strolled forward in front of the registrar’s table, paused to drop his cigarette and set a foot on it, and then without warning lashed the registrar full across the face with his riding crop. The fellow shrieked and fell back in his chair, flinging up his hands to ward another blow; the officer said something in a soft, icy voice, and the trembling hands came down, revealing the livid whip-mark on the coarse bearded face.

There wasn’t a sound in the room, except for the registrar’s whimpering, as the officer leisurely raised his crop again, and with the utmost deliberation slashed him across the face a second time, laying the bearded cheek open, while the creature screamed but didn’t dare move or protect himself. A third slash sent man and chair over, the officer looked at his whip as though it had been in the gutter, dropped it on the floor, and then turned to me.

“This offal,” says he, and to my amazement he spoke in English, “requires correction. With your permission, I shall reinforce the lesson.” He looked at the blubbering, bleeding registrar crawling out of the wreck of his chair, and rapped out a string of words in that level, chilly whisper; the stricken man changed course and came wriggling across to my feet, babbling and snuffling at my ankles in a most disgusting fashion, while the officer lit another cigarette and looked on.

“He will lick your boots,” says he, “and I have told him that if he bleeds on them, I shall have him knouted. You wish to kick him in the face?”

As you know, I’m something in the bullying line myself, and given a moment I dare say I’d have accepted; it isn’t every day you have the opportunity. But I was too amazed – aye, and alarmed, too, at the cold, deliberate brutality I’d seen, and the registrar seized the opportunity to scramble away, followed by a shattering kick from my protector.

“Scum – but rather wiser scum,” says he. “He will not insult a gentleman again. A cigarette, colonel?” And he held out a gold case of those paper abominations I’d tried at Sevastopol, but hadn’t liked. I let him light one for me; it tasted like dung soaked in treacle.

“Captain Count Nicholas Pavlovitch Ignatieff,”²² says he, in that cold, soft voice, “at your service.” And as our eyes met through the cigarette smoke I thought, hollo, this is another of those momentous encounters. You didn’t have to look at this chap twice to remember him forever. It was the eyes, as it so often is – I thought in that moment of Bismarck, and Charity Spring, and Akbar Khan; it had been the eyes with them, too. But this fellow’s were different from anything yet: one was blue, but the other had a divided iris, half-blue, half-brown, and the oddly fascinating effect of this was that you didn’t know where to look, but kept shifting from one to the other.

For the rest, he had gingerish, curling hair and a square, masterful face that was no way impaired by a badly-broken nose. He looked tough, and immensely self-assured; it was in his glance, in the abrupt way he moved, in the slant of the long cigarette between his fingers, in the rakish tilt of his peaked cap, in the immaculate white tunic of the Imperial Guards. He was the kind who knew exactly what was what, where everything was, and precisely who was who – especially himself. He was probably a devil with women, admired by his superiors, hated by his rivals, and abjectly feared by his subordinates. One word summed him up: bastard.

“I caught your name, in that beast’s outburst,” says he. He was studying me calmly, as a doctor regards a specimen. “You are the officer of Balaclava, I think. Going to Starotorsk, to be lodged with Colonel Count Pencherjevsky. He already has another English officer – under his care.” I tried to meet his eye and not keep glancing at the registrar, who had hauled himself up at a nearby table, and was shakily trying to staunch his gashed face: no one moved a finger to help him. For some reason, I found my cigarette trembling between my fingers; it was foolish, with this outwardly elegant, precise, not unfriendly young gentleman doing no more than make civil conversation. But I’d just seen him at work, and knew the kind of soulless, animal cruelty behind the suave mask. I know my villains, and this Captain Count Ignatieff was a bad one; you could feel the savage strength of the man like an electric wave.

“I will not detain you, colonel,” says he, in that same cold murmur, and there was all the immeasurable arrogance of the Russian nobleman in the way he didn’t look or beckon for my civilian escort, but simply turned his head the merest fraction, and the fellow came scurrying out of the silent crowd.

“We may meet at Starotorsk,” says Ignatieff, and with the slightest bow to me he turned away, and my escort was hustling me respectfully out to the telegue, as though he couldn’t get away fast enough. I was all for it; the less time you spend near folk like that, the better.

It left me shaken, that little encounter. Some people are just terrible, in the true sense of the word – I knew now, I thought, how Tsar Ivan had earned that nickname: it implies something far beyond the lip-licking cruelty of your ordinary torturer. Satan, if there is one, is probably a Russian; no one else could have the necessary soulless brutality; it is just part of life to them.

I asked my civilian who Ignatieff was, and got an unwilling mumble in reply. Russians don’t like to talk about their superiors at any time; it isn’t safe, and I gathered that Ignatieff was so important, and so high-born – mere captain though he was – that you just didn’t mention him at all. So I consoled myself that I’d probably seen the last of him (ha!) and took stock of the scenery instead. After a few miles the bare steppe was giving way to large, well-cultivated fields, with beasts and peasants labouring away, the road improved, and presently, on an eminence ahead of us there was a great, rambling timbered mansion with double wings, and extensive outbuildings, all walled and gated, and the thin smoke of a village just visible beyond. We bowled up a fine gravel drive between well-kept lawns with willow trees on their borders, past the arched entrance of a large courtyard, and on to a broad carriage sweep before the house, where a pretty white fountain played.

Well, thinks I, cheering up a bit, this will do. Civilization in the midst of barbarism, and very fine, too. Pleasant grounds, genteel accommodation, salubrious outlook, company’s own water no doubt, to suit overworked military man in need of rest and recreation. Flashy, my son, this will answer admirably until they sign the peace. The only note out of harmony was the Cossack guard lounging near the front steps, to remind me that I was a prisoner after all.

A steward emerged, bowing, and my civilian explained that he would conduct me to my apartment, and thereafter I would doubtless meet Count Pencherjevsky. I was led into a cool, light-panelled hall, and if anything was needed to restore my flagging spirits it was the fine furs on the well-polished floor, the comfortable leather furniture, the flowers on the table, the cosy air of civilian peace, and the delightful little blonde who had just descended the stairs. She was so unexpected, I must have goggled at her like poor Willy in the presence of his St John’s Wood whore.

And she was worth a long stare. About middle height, perhaps eighteen or nineteen, plump-bosomed, tiny in the waist, with a saucy little upturned nose, pink, dimpled cheeks and a cloud of silvery-blonde hair, she was fit to make your mouth water – especially if you hadn’t had a woman in two months, and had just finished a long, dusty journey through southern Russia, gaping at misshapen peasants. I stripped, seized, and mounted her in a twinkling of my mind’s eye, as she tripped past, I bowing my most military bow, and she disregarding me beyond a quick, startled glance from slanting grey eyes. May it be a long war, thinks I, watching her bouncing out of sight, and then my attention was taken by the major-domo, muttering the eternal “Pajalsta, excellence,” and leading me up the broad, creaky staircase, along a turning passage, and finally halting at a broad door. He knocked, and an English voice called:

“Come in – no, hang it all – khadee-tyeh!”

I grinned at the friendly familiar sound, and strode in, saying: “Hollo, yourself, whoever you are,” and putting out my hand. A man of about my own age, who had been reading on the bed, looked up in surprise, swung his legs to the ground, stood up, and then sank back on the bed again, gaping as though I were a ghost. He shook his head, stuttering, and then got out:

“Flashman! Good heavens!”

I stopped short. The face was familiar, somehow, but I didn’t know from where. And then the years rolled away, and I saw a boy’s face under a tile hat, and heard a boy’s voice saying: “I’m sorry, Flashman.” Yes, it was him all right – Scud East of Rugby.

For a long moment we just stared at each other, and then we both found our voices in the same phrase: “What on earth are you doing here?” And then we stopped, uncertainly, until I said:

“I was captured at Balaclava, three weeks back.”

“They took me at Silistria, three months ago. I’ve been here five weeks and two days.”

And then we stared at each other some more, and finally I said:

“Well, you certainly know how to make a fellow at home. Ain’t you going to offer me a chair, even?”

He jumped up at that, colouring and apologizing – still the same raw Scud, I could see. He was taller and thinner than I remembered; his brown hair was receding, too, but he still had that quick, awkward nervousness I remembered.

“I’m so taken aback,” he stuttered, pulling up a chair for me. “Why – why, I am glad to see you, Flashman! Here, give me your hand, old fellow! There! Well – well – my, what a mountainous size you’ve grown, to be sure! You always were a big … er, a tall chap, of course, but … I say, isn’t this a queer fix, us meeting again like this … after so long! Let’s see, it must be fourteen, no fifteen, years since … since … ah …”

“Since Arnold kicked me out for being pissy drunk?”

He coloured again. “I was going to say, since we said goodbye.”

“Aye. Well, ne’er mind. What’s your rank, Scud? Major, eh? I’m a colonel.”

“Yes,” says he. “I see that.” He gave me an odd, almost shy grin. “You’ve done well – everyone knows about you – all the fellows from Rugby talk about you, when one meets ’em, you know …”

“Do they, though? Not with any great love, I’ll be bound, eh, young Scud?”

“Oh, come!” cries he. “What d’you mean? Oh, stuff! We were all boys then, and boys never get on too well, ’specially when some are bigger and older and … why, that’s all done with years ago! Why – everyone’s proud of you, Flashman! Brooke and Green – and young Brooke – he’s in the Navy, you know.” He paused. “The Doctor would have been proudest of all, I’m sure.”

Aye, he probably would, thinks I, the damned old hypocrite.

“… everyone knows about Afghanistan, and India, and all that,” he ran on. “I was out there myself, you know, in the Sikh campaign, when you were winning another set of laurels. All I got was a shot wound, a hole in my ribs, and a broken arm.”²³ He laughed ruefully. “Not much to show, I’m afraid – and then I bought out of the 101st, and – but heavens, how I’m rattling on! Oh, it is good to see you, old fellow! This is the best, most famous thing! Let me have a good look at you! By George, those are some whiskers, though!”

I couldn’t be sure if he meant it, or not. God knows, Scud East had no cause to love me, and the sight of him had so taken me back to that last black day at Rugby that I’d momentarily forgotten we were men now, and things had changed – perhaps even his memories of me. For he did seem pleased to see me, now that he’d got over his surprise – of course, that could just be acting on his part, or making the best of a bad job, or just Christian decency. I found myself weighing him up; I’d knocked him about a good deal, in happier days, and it came as a satisfaction to realize that I could probably still do it now, if it came to the pinch; he was still smaller and thinner than I. At that, I’d never detested him as much as his manly-mealy little pal, Brown; he’d had more game in him than the others, had East, and now – well, if he was disposed to be civil, and let bygones be bygones … We were bound to be stuck together for some months at least.

All this in a second’s consideration – and you may think, what a mean and calculating nature, or what a guilty conscience. Never you mind; I know my own nature hasn’t changed in eighty years, so why should anyone else’s? And I never forget an injury – I’ve done too many of ’em.

So I didn’t quite enter into his joyous spirit of reunion, but was civil enough, and after he had got over his sham-ecstasies at meeting his dear old school-fellow again, I said:

“What about this place, then – and this fellow Pencherjevsky?”

He hesitated a moment, glanced towards the wall, got up, and as he walked over to it, said loudly: “Oh, it is as you see it – a splendid place. They’ve treated me well – very well indeed.” And then he beckoned me to go over beside him, at the same time laying a finger on his lips. I went, wondering, and followed his pointing finger to a curious protuberance in the ornate carving of the panelling beside the stove. It looked as though a small funnel had been sunk into the carving, and covered with a fine metal grille, painted to match the surrounding wood.

“I say, old fellow,” says East, “what d’you say to a walk? The Count has splendid gardens, and we are free of them, you know.”

I took the hint, and we descended the stairs to the hall, and out on to the lawns. The lounging Cossack looked at us, but made no move to follow. As soon as we were at a safe distance, I asked:

“What on earth was it?”

“Speaking-tube, carefully concealed,” says he. “I looked out for it as soon as I arrived – there’s one in the next room, too, where you’ll be. I fancy our Russian hosts like to be certain we’re not up to mischief.”

“Well, I’m damned! The deceitful brutes! Is that any way to treat gentlemen? And how the deuce did you know to look for it?”

“Oh, just caution,” says he, offhand, but then he thought for a moment, and went on: “I know a little about such things, you see. When I was taken at Silistria, although I was officially with the Bashi-Bazouk people, I was more on the political side, really. I think the Russians know it, too. When they brought me up this way I was most carefully examined at first by some very shrewd gentlemen from their staff – I speak some Russian, you see. Oh, yes, my mother’s family married in this direction, a few generations ago, and we had a sort of great-aunt who taught me enough to whet my interest. Anyway, on top of their suspicions of me, that accomplishment is enough to make ’em pay very close heed to H. East, Esq.”

“It’s an accomplishment you can pass on to me as fast as you like,” says I. “But d’you mean they think you’re a spy?”

“Oh, no, just worth watching – and listening to. They’re the most suspicious folk in the world, you know; trust no one, not even each other. And for all they’re supposed to be thick-headed barbarians, they have some clever jokers among ’em.”

Something made me ask: “D’you know a chap called Ignatieff – Count Ignatieff?”

“Do I not!” says he. “He was one of the fellows who ran the rule over me when I came up here. That’s Captain Swing with blue blood, that one – why, d’you know him?”

I told him what had happened earlier in the day, and he whistled. “He was there to have a look and a word with you, you may depend on it. We must watch what we say, Flashman – not that our consciences aren’t clear, but we may have some information that would be useful to them.” He glanced about. “And we won’t feed their suspicions by talking too much where they can’t hear us. Another five minutes, and we’d better get back to the room. If we want to be private there, at any time, we’ll hang a coat over their confounded tube – you may believe me, that works. But before we go in, I’ll tell you, as quickly as I may, those things that are better said in the open air.”

It struck me, he was a cool, assured hand, this East – of course, he had been all that as a boy, too.

“Count Pencherjevsky – an ogre, loud-mouthed, brutal, and a tyrant. He’s a Cossack, who rose to command a hussar regiment in the army, won the Tsar’s special favour, and retired here, away from his own tribal land. He rules his estate like a despot, treats his serfs abominably, and will surely have his throat cut one day. I can’t abide him, and keep out of his way, although I sometimes dine with the family, for appearance’s sake. But he’s been decent enough, I’ll admit; gives me the run of the place, a horse to ride, that sort of thing.”

“Ain’t they worried you might ride for it?” says I.

“Where to? We’re two hundred miles north of the Crimea here, with nothing but naked country in between. Besides, the Count has a dozen or so of his old Cossacks in his service – they’re all the guard anyone needs. Kubans, who could ride down anything on four legs. I saw them bring back four serfs who ran away, soon after I got here – they’d succeeded in travelling twenty miles before the Cossacks caught them. Those devils brought them back tied by the ankles and dragged behind their ponies – the whole way!” He shuddered. “They were flayed to death in the first few miles!”

I felt my stomach give one of its little heaves. “But, anyway, those were serfs,” says I. “They wouldn’t do that sort of thing to –”

“Wouldn’t they, though?” says he. “Well, perhaps not. But this ain’t England, you know, or France, or even India. This is Russia – and these land-owners are no more accountable than … than a baron in the Middle Ages. Oh, I dare say he’d think twice about mishandling us – still, I’d think twice about getting on his wrong side. But, I say, I think we’d best go back, and treat ’em to some harmless conversation – if anyone’s bothering to listen.”

As we strolled back, I asked him a question which had been exercising me somewhat. “Who’s the fair beauty I saw when I arrived?”

He went red as a poppy, and I thought, o-ho, what have we here, eh? Young Scud with lecherous notions – or pure Christian passion, I wonder which?

“That would be Valentina,” says he, “the Count’s daughter. She and her Aunt Sara – and an old deaf woman who is a cousin of sorts – are his only family. He is a widower.” He cleared his throat nervously. “One sees very little of them, though – as I said, I seldom dine with the family. Valentina … ah … is married.”

I found this vastly amusing – it was my guess that young Scud had gone wild about the little bundle – small blame to him – and like the holy little humbug he was, preferred to avoid her rather than court temptation. One of Arnold’s shining young knights, he was. Well, lusty old Sir Lancelot Flashy had galloped into the lists now – too bad she had a husband, of course, but at least she’d be saddle-broken. At that, I’d have to see what her father was like, and how the land lay generally. One has to be careful about these things.

I met the family at dinner that afternoon, and a most fascinating occasion it turned out to be. Pencherjevsky was worth travelling a long way to see in himself – the first sight of him, standing at his table head, justified East’s description of ogre, and made me think of Jack and the Beanstalk, and smelling the blood of Englishmen, which was an unhappy notion, when you considered it.

He must have been well over six and a half feet tall, and even so, he was broad enough to appear squat. His head and face were just a mass of brown hair, trained to his shoulders and in a splendid beard that rippled down his chest. His eyes were fine, under huge shaggy brows, and the voice that came out of his beard was one of your thunderous Russian basses. He spoke French well, by the way, and you would never have guessed from the glossy colour of his hair, and the ease with which he moved his huge bulk, that he was over sixty. An enormous man, in every sense, not least in his welcome.

“The Colonel Flashman,” he boomed. “Be happy in this house. As an enemy, I say, forget the quarrel for a season; as a soldier, I say, welcome, brother.” He shook my hand in what was probably only the top joints of his enormous fingers, and crushed it till it cracked. “Aye – you look like a soldier, sir. I am told you fought in the disgraceful affair at Balaclava, where our cavalry were chased like the rabble they are. I salute you, and every good sabre who rode with you. Chased like rabbits, those tuts^b and moujiks on horseback. Aye, you would not have chased my Kubans so – or Vigenstein’s Hussars²⁴ when I had command of them – no, by the Great God!” He glowered down at me, rumbling, as though he would break into “Fee-fi-fo-fum” at any moment, and then released my hand and waved towards the two women seated at the table.

“My daughter Valla, my sister-in-law, Madam Sara.” I bowed, and they inclined their heads and looked at me with that bold, appraising stare which Russian women use – they’re not bashful or missish, those ladies. Valentina, or Valla, as her father called her, smiled and tossed her silver-blonde head – she was a plumply pert little piece, sure enough, but I spared a glance for Aunt Sara as well. She’d be a few years older than I, about thirty-five, perhaps, with dark, close-bound hair and one of those strong, masterful, chiselled faces – handsome, but not beautiful. She’d have a moustache in a few years, but she was well-built and tall, carrying her bounties before her.

For all that Pencherjevsky looked like Goliath, he had good taste – or whoever ordered his table and domestic arrangements had. The big dining-room, like all the apartments in the house, had a beautiful wood-tiled floor, there was a chandelier, and any amount of brocade and flowered silk about the furnishings. (Pencherjevsky himself, by the way, was dressed in silk: most Russian gentlemen wear formal clothes as we do, more or less, but he affected a magnificent shimmering green tunic, clasped at the waist by a silver-buckled belt, and silk trousers of the same colour tucked into soft leather boots – a most striking costume, and comfortable too, I should imagine.)

The food was good, to my relief – a fine soup being followed by fried fish, a ragout of beef, and side-dishes of poultry and game of every variety, with little sweet cakes and excellent coffee. The wine was indifferent, but drinkable. Between the vittles, the four fine bosoms displayed across the table, and Pencherjevsky’s conversation, it was a most enjoyable meal.

He questioned me about Balaclava, most minutely, and when I had satisfied his curiosity, astonished me by rapidly sketching how the Russian cavalry should have been handled, with the aid of cutlery, which he clashed about on the table to demonstrate. He knew his business, no doubt of it, but he was full of admiration for our behaviour, and Scarlett’s particularly.

“Great God, there is an English Cossack!” says he. “Uphill, eh? I like him! I like him! Let him be captured, dear Lord, and sent to Starotorsk, so that I can keep him forever, and talk, and fight old battles, and shout at each other like good companions!”

“And get drunk nightly, and be carried to bed!” says Miss Valla, pertly – they enter into talk with the men, you know, these Russian ladies, with a freedom that would horrify our own polite society. And they drink, too – I noticed that both of them went glass for glass with us, without becoming more than a trifle merry.

“That, too, golubashka,” says Pencherjevsky. “Can he drink, then, this Scarlett? Of course, of course he must! All good horse-soldiers can, eh, colonel? Not like your Sasha, though,” says he to Valla, with a great wink at me. “Can you imagine, colonel, I have a son-in-law who cannot drink? He fell down at his wedding, on this very floor – yes, over there, by God! – after what? A glass or two of vodka! Saint Nicholas! Aye, me – how I must have offended the Father God, to have a son-in-law who cannot drink, and does not get me grandchildren.”

At this Valla gave a most unladylike snort, and tossed her head, and Aunt Sara, who said very little as a rule, I discovered, set down her glass and observed tartly that Sasha could hardly get children while he was away fighting in the Crimea.

“Fighting?” cries Pencherjevsky, boisterously. “Fighting – in the horse artillery? Whoever saw one of them coming home on a stretcher? I would have had him in the Bug Lancers, or even the Moscow Dragoons, but – body of St Sofia! – he doesn’t ride well! A fine son-in-law for a Zaporozhiyan hetman,^c that!”

“Well, dear father!” snaps Valla. “If he had ridden well, and been in the lancers or the dragoons, it is odds the English cavalry would have cut him into little pieces – since you were not there to direct operations!”

“Small loss that would have been,” grumbles he, and then leaned over, laughing, and rumpled her blonde hair. “There, little one, he is your man – such as he is. God send him safe home.”

I tell you all this to give you some notion of a Russian country gentleman at home, with his family – although I’ll own that a Cossack may not be typical. No doubt he wasn’t to East’s delicate stomach – and I gather he didn’t care for East too much, either – but I found myself liking Pencherjevsky. He was gross, loud, boisterous – boorish, if you like, but he was worth ten of your proper gentlemen, to me at any rate. I got roaring drunk with him, that evening, after the ladies had retired – they were fairly tipsy, themselves, and arguing at the tops of their voices about dresses as they withdrew to their drawing-room – and he sang Russian hunting songs in that glorious organ voice, and laughed himself sick trying to learn the words of “The British Grenadiers”. I flatter myself he took to me enormously – folk often do, of course, particularly the coarser spirits – for he swore I was a credit to my regiment and my country, and God should send the Tsar a few like me.

“Then we should sweep you English bastards into the sea!” he roared. “A few of your Scarletts and Flashmans and Carragans – that is the name, no? – that is all we need!”

But drunk as he was, when he finally rose from the table he was careful to turn in the direction of the church, and cross himself devoutly, before stumbling to guide me up the stairs.

I was to see a different side to Pencherjevsky – and to all of them for that matter – in the winter that followed, but for the first few weeks of my sojourn at Starotorsk I thoroughly enjoyed myself, and felt absolutely at home. It was so much better than I had expected, the Count was so amiable in his bear-like, thundering way, his ladies were civil (for I’d decided to go warily before attempting a more intimate acquaintance with Valla) and easy with me, and East and I were allowed such freedom, that it was like a month of week-ends at an English country-house, without any of the stuffiness. You could come and go as you pleased, treat the place as your own, attend at meal-times or feed in your chamber, whichever suited – it was Liberty Hall, no error. I divided my days between working really hard at my Russian, going for walks or rides with Valla and Sara or East, prosing with the Count in the evenings, playing cards with the family – they have a form of whist called “biritsch” which has caught on in England this last few years, and we played that most evenings – and generally taking life easy. My interest in Russian they found especially flattering, for they are immensely proud and sensitive about their country, and I made even better progress than usual. I soon spoke and understood it better than East – “He has a Cossack somewhere in his family!” Pencherjevsky would bawl. “Let him add a beard to those foolish English whiskers and he can ride with the Kubans – eh, colonel?”

All mighty pleasant – until you discovered that the civility and good nature were no deeper than a May frost, the thin covering on totally alien beings. For all their apparent civilization, and even good taste, the barbarian was just under the surface, and liable to come raging out. It was easy to forget this, until some word or incident reminded you – that this pleasant house and estate were like a medieval castle, under feudal law; that this jovial, hospitable giant, who talked so knowledgeably of cavalry tactics and the hunting field, and played chess like a master, was also as dangerous and cruel as a cannibal chief; that his ladies, chattering cheerfully about French dressmaking or flower arrangement, were in some respects rather less feminine than Dahomey Amazons.

One such incident I’ll never forget. There was an evening when the four of us were in the salon, Pencherjevsky and I playing chess – he had handicapped himself by starting without queen or castle, to make a game of it – and the women at some two-handed game of cards across the room. Aunt Sara was quiet, as usual, and Valla prattling gaily, and squeaking with vexation when she lost. I wasn’t paying much attention, for I was happy with the Count’s brandy, and looked like beating him for once, too, but when I heard them talking about settling the wager I glanced across, and almost fell from my chair.

Valla’s maid and the housekeeper had come into the room. The maid – a serf girl – was kneeling by the card table, and the housekeeper was carefully shearing off her long red hair with a pair of scissors. Aunt Sara was watching idly; Valla wasn’t even noticing until the housekeeper handed her the tresses.

“Ah, how pretty!” says she, and shrugged, and tossed them over to Aunt Sara, who stroked them, and said:

“Shall I keep them for a wig, or sell them? Thirty roubles in Moscow or St Petersburg.” And she held them up in the light, considering.

“More than Vera is worth now, at any rate,” says Valla, carelessly. Then she jumped up, ran across to Pencherjevsky, and put her arms round his shaggy neck from behind, blowing in his ear. “Father, may I have fifty roubles for a new maid?”

“What’s that?” says he, deep in the game. “Wait, child, wait; I have this English rascal trapped, if only …”

“Just fifty roubles, father. See, I cannot keep Vera now.”

He looked up, saw the maid, who was still kneeling, cropped like a convict, and guffawed. “She doesn’t need hair to hang up your dresses and fetch your shoes, does she? Learn to count your aces, you silly girl.”

“Oh, father! You know she will not do now! Only fifty roubles – please – from my kind little batiushka!”^d

“Ah, plague take you, can a man not have peace? Fifty roubles, then, to be let alone. And next time, bet something that I will not have to replace out of my purse.” He pinched her cheek. “Check, colonel.”

I’ve a strong stomach, as you know, but I’ll admit that turned it – not the disfigurement of a pretty girl, you understand, although I didn’t hold with that, much, but the cheerful unconcern with which they did it – those two cultured ladies, in that elegant room, as though they had been gaming for sweets or counters. And now Valla was leaning on her father’s shoulder, gaily urging him on to victory, and Sara was running the hair idly through her hands, while the kneeling girl bowed her pathetically shorn head to the floor and then followed the housekeeper from the room. Well, thinks I, they’d be a rage in London society, these two. You may have noticed, by the way, that the cost of a maid was fifty roubles, of which her hair was worth thirty.

Of course, they didn’t think of her as human. I’ve told you something of the serfs already, and most of that I learned first-hand on the Pencherjevsky estate, where they were treated as something worse than cattle. The more fortunate of them lived in the outbuildings and were employed about the house, but most of them were down in the village, a filthy, straggling place of log huts, called isbas, with entrances so low you had to stoop to go in. They were foul, verminous hovels, consisting of just one room, with a huge bed bearing many pillows, a big stove, and a “holy corner” in which there were poor, garish pictures of their saints.

Their food was truly fearful – rye bread for the most part, and cabbage soup with a lump of fat in it, salt cabbage, garlic stew, coarse porridge, and for delicacies, sometimes a little cucumber or beetroot. And those were the well-fed ones. Their drink was as bad – bread fermented in alcohol which they call qvass (“it’s black, it’s thick, and it makes you drunk,” as they said), and on special occasions vodka, which is just poison. They’ll sell their souls for brandy, but seldom get it.

Such conditions of squalor, half the year in stifling heat, half in unimaginable cold, and all spent in back-breaking labour, are probably enough to explain why they were such an oppressed, dirty, brutish, useless people – just like the Irish, really, but without the gaiety. Even the Mississippi niggers were happier – there was never a smile on the face of your serf, just patient, morose misery.

And yet that wasn’t the half of their trouble. I remember the court that Pencherjevsky used to hold in a barn at the back of the house, and those cringing creatures crawling on their bellies along the floor to kiss the edge of his coat, while he pronounced sentence on them for their offences. You may not believe them, but they’re true, and I noted them at the time.

There was the local dog-killer – every Russian village is plagued in winter by packs of wild dogs, who are a real danger to life, and this fellow had to chase and club them to death – he got a few kopecks for each pelt. But he had been shirking his job, it seemed.

“Forty strokes of the cudgel,” says Pencherjevsky. And then he added: “Siberia,” at which a great wail went up from the crowd trembling at the far end of the barn. One of the Cossacks just lashed at them with his nagaika,^e and the wail died.

There was an iron collar for a woman whose son had run off, and floggings, either with the cudgel or the whip, for several who had neglected their labouring in Pencherjevsky’s fields. There was Siberia for a youth employed to clean windows at the house, who had started work too early and disturbed Valla, and for one of the maids who had dropped a dish. You will say, “Ah, here’s Flashy pulling the long bow”, but I’m not, and if you don’t believe me, ask any professor of Russian history.²⁵

But here’s the point – if you’d suggested to Pencherjevsky or his ladies, or even to the serfs, that such punishments were cruel, they’d have thought you were mad. It seemed the most natural thing in the world to them – why, I’ve seen a man cudgelled by the Cossacks in Pencherjevsky’s courtyard – tied to a post half-naked in the freezing weather, and smashed with heavy rods until he was a moaning lump of bruised and broken flesh, with half his ribs cracked – and through it all Valla was standing not ten yards away, never even glancing in his direction, but discussing a new sledge-harness with one of the grooms.

Pencherjevsky absolutely believed that his moujiks were well off. “Have I hot given them a stone church, with a blue dome and gilt stars? How many villages can show the like, eh?” And when those he had condemned to years of exile in Siberia were driven off in a little coffle under the nagaikas of the Cossacks – they would be taken to the nearest town, to join other unfortunates, and they would all walk the whole way – he was there to give them his blessing, and they would embrace his knees, crying: “Izvenete, batiushka, veno vat,”^f and he would nod and say “Horrosho,”^g while the housekeeper gave them bundles of dainties from the “Sudarinia^h Valla”. God knows what they were – cucumber rinds, probably.

“From me they have strict justice, under the law,” says this amazing gorilla. “And they love me for it. Has anyone ever seen the knout, or the butuksⁱ used on my estate? No, and never shall. If I correct them, it is because without correction they will become idle and shiftless, and ruin me – and themselves. For without me, where are they? These poor souls, they believe the world rests on three whales swimming in the Eternal Sea! What are you to do with such folk? I will meet with the best, the wisest of them, the spokesman of their gromada,^j driving his droshky.^k ‘Ha, Ivan,’ I will say, ‘your axles squeal; why do you not grease them?’ And he ponders, and replies, ‘Only a thief is afraid to make a noise, batiushka.’ So the axles remain ungreased – unless I cudgel his foolish head, or have the Cossacks whip and salt his back for him. And he respects me” – he would thump his great fist on his thigh as he said it – “because he knows I am a bread and salt man, and go with my neck open, as he does.²⁶ And I am just – to the inch.”

And you may say he was: when he flogged his dvornik^l for insolence, and the fellow collapsed before the prescribed punishment was finished, they sent him to the local quack – and when he was better, gave him the remaining strokes. “Who would trust me again, if I excused him a single blow?” says Pencherjevsky.

Now, I don’t recite all these barbarities to shock or excite your pity, or to pose as one of those holy hypocrites who pretend to be in a great sweat about man’s inhumanity to man. I’ve seen too much of it, and know it happens wherever strong folk have absolute power over spiritless creatures. I merely tell you truly what I saw – as for my own view, well, I’m all for keeping the peasants in order, and if hammering ’em does good, and makes life better for the rest of us, you won’t find me leaping between the tyrant and his victim crying “Stay, cruel despot!” But I would observe that much of the cruelty I saw in Russia was pure senseless brutishness – I doubt if they even enjoyed it much. They just knew no better.

I wondered sometimes why the serfs, dull, ignorant, superstitious clods though they were, endured it. The truth, as I learned it from Pencherjevsky, was that they didn’t, always. In the thirty years just ending when I was in Russia, there had been peasant revolts once every fortnight, in one part of the country or another, and as often as not it had taken the military to put them down. Or rather, it had taken the Cossacks, for the Russian army was a useless thing, as we’d seen in the Crimea. You can’t make soldiers out of slaves. But the Cossacks were free, independent tribesmen; they had land, and paid little tax, had their own tribal laws, drank themselves stupid, and served the Tsar from boyhood till they were fifty because they loved to ride and fight and loot – and they liked nothing better than to use their nagaikas on the serfs, which was just nuts to them.

Pencherjevsky wasn’t worried about revolution among his own moujiks because, as I say, he regarded himself as a good master. Also he had Cossacks of his own to strike terror into any malcontents. “And I never commit the great folly,” says he. “I never touch a serf-woman – or allow one to be used or sold as a concubine.” (Whether he said it for my benefit or not, it was bad news, for I hadn’t had a female in ages, and some of the peasants – like Valla’s maid – were not half bad-looking once they were washed.) “These uprisings on other estates – look into them, and I’ll wager every time the master has ravished some serf wench, or stolen a moujik’s wife, or sent a young fellow into the army so that he can enjoy his sweetheart. They don’t like it, I tell you – and I don’t blame them! If a lord wants a woman, let him marry one, or buy one from far afield – but let him slake his lust on one of his own serf-women, and he’ll wake up one fine morning with a split head and his roof on fire. And serve him right!”

I gathered he was unusual in this view: most landlords just used the serf-wenches the way American owners used their nigger girls, and pupped ’em all over the place. But Pencherjevsky had his own code, and believed his moujiks thought the better of him for it, and were content. I wondered if he wasn’t gammoning himself.

Because I paid attention, toady-like, to his proses, and was eager in studying his language, he assumed I was interested in his appalling country and its ways, and was at pains to educate me, as he saw it. From him I learned of the peculiar laws governing the serfs – how they might be free if they could run away for ten years, how some of them were allowed to leave the estates and work in the towns, provided they sent a proportion of earnings to their master; how some of these serfs became vastly rich – richer than their masters, sometimes, and worth millions – but still could not buy their freedom unless he wished. Some serfs even owned serfs. It was an idiotic system, of course, but the landowners were all for it, and even the humanitarian ones believed that if it were changed, and political reforms allowed, the country would dissolve in anarchy. I daresay they were right, but myself I believe it will happen anyway; it was starting even then, as Pencherjevsky admitted.

“The agitators are never idle,” says he. “You have heard of the pernicious German-Jew, Marx?” (I didn’t like to tell him Marx had been at my wedding, as an uninvited guest.^m) “He vomits his venom over Europe – aye, he and other vile rascals like him would spread their poison even to our country if they could.²⁷ Praise God the moujiks are unlettered folk – but they can hear, and our cities crawl with revolutionary criminals of the lowest stamp. What do they understand of Russia, these filth? What do they seek to do but ruin her? And yet countries like your own give harbour to such creatures, to brew their potions of hate against us! Aye, and against you, too, if you could only see it! You think to encourage them, for the downfall of your enemies, but you will reap the wild wind also, Colonel Flashman!”

“Well, you know, Count,” says I, “we let chaps say what they like, pretty well, always have done. We don’t have any kabala,ⁿ like you – don’t seem to need it, for some reason. Probably because we have factories, and so on, and everyone’s kept busy, don’t you know? I don’t doubt all you say is true – but it suits us, you see. And our moujiks are, well, different from yours.” I wondered, even as I said it, if they were; remembering that hospital at Yalta, I doubted it. But I couldn’t help adding: “Would your moujiks have ridden into the battery at Balaclava?”

At this he roared with laughter, and called me an evil English rascal, and clapped me on the back. We were mighty close, he and I, really, when I look back – but of course, he never really knew me.

So you see what kind of man he was, and what kind of a place it was. Most of the time, I liked it – it was a fine easy life until, as I say, you got an unpleasant reminder of what an alien, brooding hostile land it was. It was frightening then, and I had to struggle to make myself remember that England and London and Elspeth still existed, that far away to the south Cardigan was still croaking “Haw-haw” and Raglan was fussing in the mud at Sevastopol. I would look out of my window sometimes, at the snow-frosted garden, and beyond it the vast, white, endless plain, streaked only by the dark field-borders, and it seemed the old world was just a dream. It was easy then, to get the Russian melancholy, which sinks into the bones, and is born of a knowledge of helplessness far from home.

The thing that bored me most, needless to say, was being without a woman. I tried my hand with Valla, when we got to know each other and I had decided she wasn’t liable to run squealing to her father. By George, she didn’t need to. I gave her bottom a squeeze, and she laughed at me and told me she was a respectable married woman; taking this as an invitation I embraced her, at which she wriggled and giggled, puss-like, and then hit me an atrocious clout in the groin with her clenched fist, and ran off, laughing. I walked with a crouch for days, and decided that these Russian ladies must be treated with respect.

East felt the boredom of captivity in that white wilderness more than I, and spent long hours in his room, writing. One day when he was out I had a turn through his papers, and discovered he was writing his impressions, in the form of an endless letter to his odious friend Brown, who was apparently farming in New Zealand. There was some stuff about me in it, which I read with interest:

“… I don’t know what to think of Flashman. He is very well liked by all in the house, the Count especially, and I fear that little Valla admires him, too – it would be hard not to, I suppose, for he is such a big, handsome fellow. (Good for you, Scud; carry on.) I say I fear – because sometimes I see him looking at her, with such an ardent expression, and I remember the kind of brute he was at Rugby, and my heart sinks for her fair innocence. Oh, I trust I am wrong! I tell myself that he has changed – how else did the mean, cowardly, spiteful, bullying toady (steady, now, young East) become the truly brave and valiant soldier that he now undoubtedly is? But I do fear, just the same; I know he does not pray, and that he swears, and has evil thoughts, and that the cruel side of his nature is still there. Oh, my poor little Valla – but there, old fellow, I mustn’t let my dark suspicions run away with me. I must think well of him, and trust that my prayers will help to keep him true, and that he will prove, despite my doubts, to be an upright, Christian gentleman at last.”

You know, the advantage to being a wicked bastard is that everyone pesters the Lord on your behalf; if volume of prayers from my saintly enemies means anything, I’ll be saved when the Archbishop of Canterbury is damned. It’s a comforting thought.

So time passed, and Christmas came and went, and I was slipping into a long, bored tranquil snooze as the months went by. And I was getting soft, and thoroughly off guard, and all the time hell was preparing to break loose.

It was shortly before “the old wives’ winter”, as the Russians call February, that Valla’s husband came home for a week’s furlough. He was an amiable, studious little chap, who got on well with East, but the Count plainly didn’t like him, and once he had given us the news from Sevastopol – which was that the siege was still going on, and getting nowhere, which didn’t surprise me – old Pencherjevsky just ignored him, and retired moodily to his study and took to drink. He had me in to help him, too, and I caught him giving me odd, thoughtful looks, which was disconcerting, and growling to himself before topping up another bumper of brandy, and drinking sneering toasts to “the blessed happy couple”, as he called them.

Then, exactly a week after Valla’s husband had gone back – with no very fond leave-taking from his little spouse, it seemed to me – I was sitting yawning in the salon over a Russian novel, when Aunt Sara came in, and asked if I was bored. I was mildly surprised, for she seldom said much, or addressed one directly. She looked me up and down, with no expression on that fine horse face, and then said abruptly:

“What you need is a Russian steam-bath. It is the sovereign remedy against our long winters. I have told the servants to make it ready. Come.”

I was idle enough to be game for anything, so I put on my tulup,^o and followed her to one of the farthest outbuildings, beyond the house enclosure; it was snowing like hell, but a party of the servants had a great fire going under a huge grille out in the snow, and Aunt Sara took me inside to show me how the thing worked. It was a big log structure, divided down the middle by a high partition, and in the half where we stood was a raised wooden slab, like a butcher’s block, surrounded by a trench in the floor. Presently the serfs came in, carrying on metal stretchers great glowing stones which they laid in the trench; the heat was terrific, and Aunt Sara explained to me that you lay on the slab, naked, while the minions outside poured cold water through openings at the base of the wall, which exploded into steam when it touched the stones.

“This side is for men-folk,” says she. “Women are through there” – and she pointed to a gap in the partition. “Your clothes go in the sealed closet on the wall, and when you are ready you lie motionless on the slab, and allow the steam to envelop you.” She gave me her bored stare. “The door is bolted from within.” And off she went, to the other side of the partition.

Well, it was something new, so I undressed and lay on the slab, Aunt Sara called out presently from beyond the partition, and the water came in like Niagara. It hissed and splashed on the stones, and in a twinkling the ‘place was like London fog, choking, scalding, and blotting you in, and you lay there gasping while it sweated into you, turning you scarlet. It was hellish hot and clammy, but not unpleasant, and I lay soaking in it; by and by they pumped in more water, the steam gushed up again, and I was turning over drowsily on my face when Aunt Sara’s voice spoke unexpectedly at my elbow.

“Lie still,” says she, and peering through the mist, I saw that she was wrapped in a clinging sheet, with her long, dark hair hanging in wet strands on either side of that strong, impassive face. I suddenly choked with what East would have called dark thoughts; she was carrying a bunch of long birch twigs, and as she laid a hot, wet hand on my shoulder she muttered huskily: “This is the true benefit of the baths; do not move.”

And then, in that steam-heat, she began to birch me, very lightly at first, up the backs of my legs and to my shoulders, and then back again, harder and harder all the time, until I began to yelp. More steam came belching up, and she turned me over and began work on my chest and stomach. I was fairly interested by now, for mildly painful though it was, it was distinctly stimulating.

“Now, for me,” says she, and motioned me to get up and take the birches. “Russian ladies often use nettles,” says she, and for once her voice was unsteady. “I prefer the birch – it is stronger.” And in a twinkling she was out of her sheet and face down on the slab. I was having a good gloat down at that long, strong, naked body, when the damned serfs blotted everything out with steam again, so I lashed away through the murk, belabouring her vigorously; she began to moan and gasp, and I went at it like a man possessed, laying on so that the twigs snapped, and as the steam cleared again she rolled over on her back, mouth open and eyes staring, and reached out to seize hold of me, pumping away at me and gasping:

“Now! Now! For me! Pajalsta! I must have! Now! Pajalsta!”

Now, I can recognize a saucy little flirt when I see one, so I gave her a few last thrashes and leaped aboard, nearly bursting. God, it must have been months – so in my perversity, I had to tease her, until she dragged me down, sobbing and scratching at my back, and we whaled away on that wet slab, with the steam thundering round us, and she writhed and grappled fit to dislocate herself, until I began to fear we would slither off on to the hot stones. And when I lay there, utterly done, she slipped away and doused me with a bucket of cold water – what with one thing and another, I wonder I survived that bath.

Mind you, I felt better for it; barbarians they may be, but the Russians have some excellent institutions, and I remain grateful to Sara – undoubtedly my favourite aunt.

I supposed, in my vanity, that she had just proposed our steam-bath romp to help pass the winter, but there was another reason, as I discovered the following day. It was a bizarre, unbelievable thing, really, to people like you and me, but in feudal Russia – well, I shall tell you.

It was after the noon meal that Pencherjevsky invited me to go riding with him. This wasn’t unusual, but his manner was; he was curt and silent as we rode – if it had been anyone but this hulking tyrant, I’d have said he was nervous. We rode some distance from the house, and were pacing our beasts through the silent snow-fields, when he suddenly began to talk – about the Cossacks, of all things. He rambled most oddly at first, about how they rode with bent knees, like jockeys (which I’d noticed anyway), and how you could tell a Ural Cossack from the Black Sea variety because one wore a sheepskin cap and the other the long string-haired bonnet. And how the flower of the flock were his own people, the Zaporozhiyan Cossacks, or Kubans, who had been moved east to new lands near Azov by the Empress generations ago, but he, Pencherjevsky, had come back to the old stamping-ground, and here he would stay, by God, and his family after him forever.

“The old days are gone,” says he, and I see him so clearly still, that huge bulk in his sheepskin tulup, hunched in his saddle, glowering with moody, unseeing eyes across the white wilderness, with the blood-red disc of the winter sun behind him. “The day of the great Cossack, when we thumbed our noses at Tsar and Sultan alike, and carried our lives and liberty on our lance-points. We owed loyalty to none but our comrades and the hetman we elected to lead us – I was such a one. Now it is a new Russia, and instead of the hetman we have rulers from Moscow to govern the tribe. So be it. I make my place here, in my forefathers’ land, I have my good estate, my moujiks, my land – the inheritance for the son I never sired.” He looked at me. “I would have had one like you, a tall lancer fit to ride at the head of his own sotnia.^p You have a son, eh? A sturdy fellow? Good. I could wish it were not so – that you had no wife in England, no son, nothing to bind you or call you home. I would say to you then: ‘Stay with us here. Be as a son to me. Be a husband to my daughter, and get yourself a son, and me a grandson, who will follow after us, and hold our land here, in this new Russia, this empire born of storm, where only a man who is a man can hope to plant himself and his seed and endure.’ That is what I would say.”

Well, it was flattering, no question, although I might have pointed out to him that Valla had a husband already, and even if I’d been free and willing … but it occurred to me that he probably wasn’t the man to let a little thing like that stand in the way. Morrison may not have been much of a father-in-law, but this chap would have been less comfortable still.

“As it is,” he growled on, “I have a son-in-law – you saw what kind of a thing he is. God knows how any daughter of mine could … but there. I have doted on her, and indulged her, for her dear mother’s sake – aye, and because I love her. And if he was the last man I would have chosen for her – well, she cared for him, and I thought, their sons will have my blood, they may be Cossacks, horse-and-lance men, grandchildren to be proud of. But I have no grandsons – he gets me none!”

And he growled and spat and then swung round to face me. For a moment he wrestled with his tongue, and couldn’t speak, and then it came out in a torrent.

“There must be a man to follow me here! I am too old now, there are no children left in me, or I would marry again. Valla, my lovely child, is my one hope – but she is tied to this … this empty thing, and I see her going childless to her grave. Unless …” He was gnawing at his lip, and his face was terrific. “Unless … she can bear me a grandson. It is all I have to live for! To see a Pencherjevsky who will take up this inheritance when I am gone – be his father who he will, so long as he is a man! It cannot be her husband, so … If it is an offence against God, against the Church, against the law – I am a Cossack, and we were here before God or the Church or the law! I do not care! I will see a male grandchild of mine to carry my line, my name, my land – and if I burn in hell for it, I shall count it worth the cost! At least a Pencherjevsky shall rule here – what I have built will not be squandered piecemeal among the rabble of that fellow’s knock-kneed relatives! A man shall get my Valla a son!”

I’m not slow on the uptake, even with a bearded baboon nearly seven feet tall roaring at my face from a few inches away, and what I understood from this extraordinary outburst simply took my breath away. I’m all for family, you understand, but I doubt if I have the dynastic instinct as strong as all that.

“You are such a man,” says he, and suddenly he edged his horse even closer, and crushed my arm in his enormous paw. “You can get sons – you have done so,” he croaked, his livid face beside mine. “You have a child in England – and Sara has proved you also. When the war is over, you will leave here, and go to England, far away. No one will ever know – but you and I!”

I found my voice, and said something about Valla.

“She is my daughter,” says he, and his voice rasped like an iron file. “She knows what this means to the house of Pencherjevsky. She obeys.” And for the first time he smiled, a dreadful, crooked grin through his beard. “From what Sara tells me, she may be happy to obey. As for you, it will be no hardship. And” – he took me by the shoulder, rocking me in the saddle – “it may be worth much or little, but hereafter you may call Pencherjevsky from the other side of hell, and he will come to your side!”

If it was an extraordinary proposition, I won’t pretend it was unwelcome. Spooky, of course, but immensely flattering, after all. And you only had to imagine, for a split second, what Pencherjevsky’s reaction would have been to a polite refusal – I say no more.

“It will be a boy,” says he, “I know it. And if by chance it is a girl – then she shall have a man for a husband, if I have to rake the world for him!”

An impetuous fellow, this Count – it never occurred to him that it might be his little Valla who was barren, and not her husband. However, that was not for me to say, so I kept mum, and left all the arrangements to papa.

He did it perfectly, no doubt with the connivance of that lustful slut Sara – there was a lady who took pleasure in her experimental work, all right. I sallied forth at midnight, and feeling not unlike a prize bull at the agricultural show – “’ere ’e is, ladies ’n’ gennelmen, Flashman Buttercup the Twenty-first of Horny Bottom Farm” – tip-toed out of the corridor where my room and East’s lay, and set off on the long promenade to the other wing. It was ghostly in that creaky old house, with not a soul about, but true love spurred me on, and sure enough Valla’s door was ajar, with a little sliver of light lancing across the passage floor.

I popped in – and she was kneeling beside the bed, praying! I didn’t know whether it was for forgiveness for the sin of adultery, or for the sin to be committed successfully, and I didn’t stop to ask. There’s no point in talking, or hanging back shuffling on these occasions, and saying: “Ah … well, shall we …?” On the other hand, one doesn’t go roaring and ramping at respectable married women, so I stooped and kissed her very gently, drew off her nightdress, and eased her on to the bed. I felt her plump little body trembling under my hands, so I kissed her long and carefully, fondling her and murmuring nonsense in her ear, and then her arms went round my neck.

Frankly, I think the Count had under-estimated her horse artillery husband, for she had learned a great deal from somewhere. I’d been prepared for her to be reluctant, or to need some jollying along, but she entered into the spirit of the thing like a tipsy widow, and it was from no sense of duty or giving the house of Pencherjevsky its money’s worth that I stayed until past four o’clock. I do love a bouncy blonde with a hearty appetite, and when I finally crawled back to my own chilly bed it was with the sense of an honest night’s work well done.

But if a job is worth doing, it’s worth doing well, and since there seemed to be an unspoken understanding that the treatment should be continued, I made frequent forays to Valla’s room in the ensuing nights. And so far as I’m a judge, the little baggage revelled in being a dutiful daughter – they’re a damned randy lot, these Russians. Something to do with the cold weather, I dare say. A curious thing was, I soon began to feel as though we were truly married, and no doubt this had something to do with the purpose behind our night games; yet during the day we remained on the same easy terms as before, and if Sara grudged her niece the pleasuring she was getting, she never let on. Pencherjevsky said nothing, but from time to time I would catch him eyeing us with sly satisfaction, fingering his beard at the table head.

East suspected something, I’m certain. His manner to me became nervous, and he avoided the family’s society even more than before, but he didn’t dare say anything. Too scared of finding his suspicions well grounded, I suppose.

The only fly in the ointment that I could see was the possibility that during the months ahead it might become apparent that I was labouring in vain; however, I was ready to face Pencherjevsky’s disappointment when and if it came. Valla’s yawns at breakfast were proof that I was doing my share manfully. And then something happened which made the whole speculation pointless.

From time to time in the first winter months there had been other guests at the big house of Starotorsk: military ones. The nearest township – where I’d encountered Ignatieff – was an important army head-quarters, a sort of staging post for the Crimea, but as there was no decent accommodation in the place, the more important wayfarers were in the habit of putting up with Pencherjevsky. On these occasions East and I were politely kept in our rooms, with a Cossack posted in the corridor, and our meals sent up on trays, but we saw some of the comings and goings from our windows – Liprandi, for example, and a grandee with a large military staff whom East said was Prince Worontzoff. After one such visit it was obvious to both of us that some sort of military conference had been held in the Count’s library – you could smell it the next morning, and there was a big map easel leaned up in a corner that hadn’t been there before.

“We should keep our eyes and ears open,” says East to me later. “Do you know – if we could have got out of our rooms when that confabulation was going on, we might have crept into the old gallery up yonder, and heard all kinds of useful intelligence.”

This was a sort of screened minstrel’s gallery that overlooked the library; you got into it by a little door off the main landing. But it was no welcome suggestion to me, as you can guess, who am all for lying low.

“Rot!” says I. “We ain’t spies – and if we were, and the whole Russian general staff were to blab their plans within earshot, what could we do with the knowledge?”

“Who knows –” says he, looking keen. “That Cossack they put to watch our doors sleeps half the night – did you know? Reeking of brandy. We could get out, I daresay – I tell you what, Flashman, if another high ranker comes this way, I think we’re bound to try and overhear him, if we can. It’s our duty.”

“Duty?” says I, alarmed. “Duty to eavesdrop? What kind of company have you been keeping lately? I can’t see Raglan, or any other honourable man, thinking much of that sort of conduct.” The high moral line, you see; deuced handy sometimes. “Why, we’re as good as guests in this place.”

“We’re prisoners,” says he, “and we haven’t given any parole. Any information we can come by is a legitimate prize of war – and if we heard anything big enough it might even be worth trying a run for it. We’re not that far from the Crimea.”

This was appalling. Wherever you go, however snug you may have made yourself, there is always one of these duty-bound, energetic bastards trying to make trouble. The thought of spying on the Russians, and then lighting out in the snow some dark night, with Pencherjevsky’s Cossacks after us – my imagination was in full flight in a trice, while Scud stood chewing his Up, muttering his thoughtful lunacies. I didn’t argue – it would have looked bad, as though I weren’t as eager to strike a blow for Britannia as he was. And it wasn’t even worth talking about – we weren’t going to get the chance to spy, or escape, or do anything foolish. I’d have given a thousand to one on that – which, as it turned out, would have been very unwise odds to offer.

However, after that small discussion the weeks had slipped by without any other important Russians visiting the place, and then came my diversion with Valla, and East’s ridiculous day-dream went clean out of my mind. And then, about ten days after I had started galloping her, a couple of Ruski staff captains jingled into the courtyard one morning, to be followed by a large horse-sled, and shortly afterwards comes the Count’s major-domo to East and me, presenting his apologies, and chivvying us off to our rooms.

We took the precaution of muffling the hidden speaking-tube, and kept a good watch from East’s window that day. We saw more sleds arrive, and from the distant hum of voices in the house and the sound of tramping on the stairs we realized there must be a fair-sized party in the place. East was all excited, but what really stirred him was when a sled arrived late in the afternoon, and Pencherjevsky himself was in the yard to meet it – attired as we’d never seen him before, in full dress uniform.

“This is important,” says East, his eyes alight. “Depend upon it, that’s some really big wig. Gad! I’d give a year’s pay to hear what passes below tonight.” He was white with excitement. “Flashman, I’m going to have a shot at it!”

“You’re crazy,” says I. “With a Cossack mooching about the passage all night? You say he sleeps – he can wake up, too, can’t he?”

“I’ll chance that,” says he, and for all I could try – appeals to his common sense, to his position as a guest, to his honour as an officer (I think I even invoked Arnold and religion) he remained set.

“Well, don’t count on me,” I told him. “It ain’t worth it – they won’t be saying anything worth a damn – it ain’t safe, and by thunder, it’s downright ungentlemanly. So now!”

To my surprise, he patted my arm. “I respect what you say, old fellow,” says he. “But – I can’t help it. I may be wrong, but I see my duty differently, don’t you understand? I know it’s St Paul’s to a pub it’ll be a fool’s errand, but – well, you never know. And I’m not like you – I haven’t done much for Queen and country. I’d like to try.”

Well, there was nothing for it but to get my head under the bed-clothes that night and snore like hell, to let the world know that Flashy wasn’t up to mischief. Neither, it transpired, was the bold East: he reported next day that the Cossack had stayed awake all night, so his expedition had to be called off. But the sleds stayed there all day, and the next, and they kept us cooped up all the time, and the Cossack remained vigilant, to East’s mounting frenzy.

“Three days!” says he. “Who can it be, down there? I tell you, it must be some important meeting! I know it! And we have to sit here, like mice in a cage, when if we could only get out for an hour, we might find out something that would – oh, I don’t know, but it might be vital to the war! It’s enough to drive a chap out of his wits!”

“It already has,” says I. “You haven’t been shut up like this before, have you? Well, I’ve been a prisoner more times than I care to think of, and I can tell you, after a while you don’t reason straight any longer. That’s what’s wrong with you. Also, you’re tired out; get to sleep tonight, and forget this nonsense.”

He fretted away, though, and I was almost out of patience with him by dinner-time, when who should come up with the servants bearing dinner, but Valla. She had just dropped in to see us, she said, and was very bright, and played a three-handed card game with us, which was a trying one for East, I could see. He was jumpy as a cat with her at the best of times, blushing and falling over his feet, and now in addition he was fighting to keep from asking her what was afoot downstairs, and who the visitors were. She prattled on, till about nine, and then took her leave, and as I held the door for her she gave me a glance and a turn of her pretty blonde head that said, as plain as words: “It’s been three nights now. Well?” I went back to my room next door, full of wicked notions, and leaving East yawning and brooding.

If I hadn’t been such a lustful brute, no doubt prudence would have kept me abed that night. But at midnight I was peeping out, and there was the Cossack, slumped on his stool, head back and mouth open, reeking like Davis’s cellar. Valla’s work, thinks I, the charming little wretch. I slipped past him, and he never even stirred, and I padded out of the pool of lamplight round him and reached the big landing.

All was still up here, but there was a dim light down in the hall, and through the banisters I could see two white-tunicked and helmeted sentries on the big double doors of the library, with their sabres drawn, and an orderly officer pacing idly about smoking a cigarette. It struck me that it wasn’t safe to be gallivanting about this house in the dark – they might think I was on the East tack, spying – so I flitted on, and two minutes later was stallioning away like billy-o with my modest flower of the steppes – by jingo, she was in a fine state of passion, I remember. We had one violent bout, and then some warm wine from her little spirit lamp, and talked softly and dozed and played, and then went to it again, very slowly and wonderfully, and I can see that lovely white shape in the flickering light even now, and smell the perfume of that silver hair, and – dear me, how we old soldiers do run on.

“You must not linger too long, sweetheart,” says she, at last. “Even drunk Cossacks don’t sleep forever,” and giggled, nibbling at my chin. So I kissed her a long good-night, with endearments, resumed my night-shirt, squeezed her bouncers again for luck, and toddled out into the cold, along her corridor, down the little stairs to the landing – and froze in icy shock against the wall on the second step, my heart going like a hammer.

There was someone on the landing. I could hear him, and then see him by the dim light from the far corridor where my room lay. He was crouched by the archway, listening, a man in a night-shirt, like myself. With a wrenching inward sigh, I realized that it could only be East.

The fool had stayed awake, seen the Cossack asleep, and was now bent on his crack-brained patriotic mischief. I hissed very gently, had the satisfaction of seeing him try to leap through the wall, and then was at his side, shushing him for all I was worth. He seized me, gurgling.

“You! Flashman!” He let out a shuddering breath. “What –? You’ve been … why didn’t you. tell me?” I wondered what the blazes he meant, until he whispered fiercely: “Good man! Have you heard anything? Are they still there?”

The madman seemed to think I’d been on his eavesdropping lay. Well, at least I’d be spared recriminations for fornicating with his adored object. I shook my head, he bit his lip, and then the maniac breathed in my ear: “Come, then, quickly! Into the gallery – they’re still down there!” And while I was peeping, terrified, into the dimness through the banisters, where the white sentries were still on guard, he suddenly flitted from my side across the landing. I daren’t even try a loud whisper to call him back; he was fumbling with the catch of the little door in the far shadows, and I was just hesitating before bolting for bed and safety, when from our corridor sounded a cavernous yawn. Panicking, I shot across like a whippet, clutching vainly at East as he slipped through the low aperture into the gallery. Come back, come back, you mad bastard, my lips were saying, but no sound emerged, which was just as well, for with the opening of the little gallery door the clear tones of someone in the library echoed up to us. And light was filtering up through the fine screen which concealed the gallery from the floor below. If our Cossack guard was waking, and took a turn to the landing, he’d see the dim glow from the open gallery door. Gibbering silently to myself, half-way inside the little opening, I crept forward, edging the door delicately shut behind me.

East was flat on the dusty gallery floor, his feet towards me; it stank like a church in the confined space between the carved wooden screen on the one hand and the wall on the other. My head was no more than a foot from the screen; thank God it was a nearly solid affair, with only occasional carved apertures. I lay panting and terrified, hearing the voice down in the library saying in Russian:

“… so there would be no need to vary the orders at present. The establishment is large enough, and would not be affected.”

I remember those words because they were the first I heard, but for the next few moments I was too occupied with scrabbling at East’s feet, and indicating to him in dumb show that the sooner we were out of this the better, to pay any heed to what they were talking about. But damn him, he wouldn’t budge, but kept gesturing me to lie still and listen. So I did, and some first-rate military intelligence we overheard, too – about the appointment of a commissary-general for the Omsk region, and whether the fellow who commanded Orianburg oughtn’t to be retired. Horse Guards would give their buttocks to know this, thinks I furiously, and I had just determined to slide out and leave East alone to his dangerous and useless foolery, when I became conscious of a rather tired, hoarse, but well-bred voice speaking in the library, and one word that he used froze me where I lay, ears straining:

“So that is the conclusion of our agenda? Good. We are grateful to you, gentlemen. You have laboured well, and we are well pleased with the reports you have laid before us. There is Item Seven, of course,” and the voice paused. “Late as it is, perhaps Count Ignatieff would favour us with a résumé of the essential points again.”

Ignatieff. My icy bully of the registrar’s office. For no reason I felt my pulse begin to run even harder. Cautiously I turned my head, and put an eye to the nearest aperture.

Down beneath us, Pencherjevsky’s fine long table was agleam with candles and littered with papers. There were five men round it. At the far end, facing us, Ignatieff was standing, very spruce and masterful in his white uniform; behind him there was the huge easel, covered with maps. On the side to his left was a stout, white-whiskered fellow in a blue uniform coat frosted with decorations – a marshal if ever I saw one. Opposite him, on Ignatieff’s right, was a tall, bald, beak-nosed civilian, with his chin resting on his folded hands. At the end nearest us was a high-backed chair whose wings concealed the occupant, but I guessed he was the last speaker, for an aide seated at his side was saying:

“Is it necessary, majesty? It is approved, after all, and I fear your majesty is over-tired already. Perhaps tomorrow …”

“Let it be tonight,” says the hidden chap, and his voice was dog-weary. “I am not as certain of my tomorrows as I once was. And the matter is of the first urgency. Pray proceed, Count.”

As the aide bowed I was aware of East craning to squint back at me. His face was a study and his lips silently framed the words: “Tsar? The Tsar?”

Well, who else would they call majesty?²⁸ I didn’t know, but I was all ears and eyes now as Ignatieff bowed, and half-turned to the map behind him. That soft, metallic voice rang upwards from the library panelling.

“Item Seven, the plan known as the expedition of the Indus. By your majesty’s leave.”

I thought I must have misheard. Indus – that was in Northern India! What the devil did they have to do with that?

“Clause the first,” says Ignatieff. “That with the attention of the allied Powers, notably Great Britain, occupied in their invasion of your majesty’s Crimean province, the opportunity arises to further the policy of eastward pacification and civilization in those unsettled countries beyond our eastern and southern borders. Clause the second, that the surest way of fulfilling this policy, and at the same time striking a vital blow at the enemy, is to destroy, by native rebellion aided by armed force, the British position on the Indian continent. Clause the third, that the time for armed invasion by your majesty’s imperial forces is now ripe, and will be undertaken forthwith. Hence, the Indus expedition.”

I think I had stopped breathing; I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

“Clause the fourth,” says Ignatieff. “The invasion is to be made by an imperial force of thirty thousand men, of whom ten thousand will be Cossack cavalry. General Duhamel,” and he bowed towards the bald chap, “your majesty’s agent in Teheran, believes that it would be assisted if Persia could be provoked into war against Britain’s ally, Turkey. Clause the fifth –”

“Never mind the clauses,” says Duhamel. “That advice has been withdrawn. Persia will remain neutral, but hostile to British interest – as she always has been.”

Ignatieff bowed again. “With your majesty’s leave. It is so agreed, and likewise approved that the Afghan and Sikh powers should be enlisted against the British, in our invasion. They will understand – as will the natives of India – that our expedition is not one of conquest, but to overthrow the English and liberate India.” He paused. “We shall thus be liberating the people who are the source of Britain’s wealth.”

He picked up a pointer and tapped the map, which was of Central Asia and Northern India. “We have considered five possible routes which the invasion might take. First, the three desert routes – Ust-Yurt-Khiva-Herat, or Raim-Bokhara, or Raim-Syr Daria-Tashkent. These, although preferred by General Khruleff” – at this the stout, whiskered fellow stirred in his seat – “have been abandoned because they run through the unsettled areas where we are still engaged in pacifying the Tajiks, Uzbeks and Khokandians, under the brigand leaders Yakub Beg and Izzat Kutebar. Although stinging reverses have been administered to these lawless bandits, and their stronghold of Ak Mechet occupied, they may still be strong enough to hinder the expedition’s advance. The less fighting there is to do before we cross the Indian frontier the better.”

Ignatieff lowered his pointer on the map. “So the southern routes, beneath the Caspian, are preferred – either through Tabriz and Teheran, or by Herat. An immediate choice is not necessary. The point is that infantry and artillery may be moved with ease across the South Caspian to Herat, while the cavalry move through Persia. Once we are in Persia, the British will have warning of our attempt, but by then it will be too late – far too late. We shall proceed through Kandahar and Kabul, assisted by the hatred which the Afghans owe the British, and so – to India.

“There are, by reliable report, twenty-five thousand British troops in India, and three hundred thousand native soldiers. These latter present no problem – once a successful invasion is launched, the majority of them will desert, or join in the rebellion which our presence will inspire. It is doubtful if, six months after we cross the Khyber, a single British soldier, civilian, or settlement will remain on the continent. It will have been liberated, and restored to its people. They will require our assistance, and armed presence, for an indefinite period, to guard against counter-invasion.”

At this I heard East mutter, “I’ll bet they will.” I could feel him quivering with excitement; myself, I was trying to digest the immensity of the thing. Of course, it had been a fear in India since I could remember – the Great Bear coming over the passes, but no one truly believed they’d ever have the nerve or the ability to try it. But now, here it was – simple, direct, and certain. Not the least of the coincidences of our remarkable eavesdrop was that I, who knew as much about Afghan affairs from first hand, and our weakness on the north Indian frontier, as any man living, should be one of the listeners. As I took it in, I could see it happening; yes, they could do it all right.

“That, your majesty,” Ignatieff was saying, “is an essential sketch of our purpose. We have all studied the plans in detail, as has your highness, and unless some new points have arisen from my résumé, your majesty will no doubt wish to confirm the royal assent already given.” He said it with deference, trying to hide his eagerness – your promoter anxious to get the official seal.

“Thank you, Count.” It was the weak voice again. “We have it clear. Gentlemen?” There was a pause. “It is a weighty matter. No such attempt has ever been made before. But we are confident – are we not?”

Khruleff nodded slowly. “It has always been possible. Now it is a certainty. In a stroke, we clear the British from India, and extend your majesty’s imperial … influence from the North Cape to the isle of Ceylon. No Tsar in history has achieved such an advance for our country. The troops are ample, the planning exact, the conditions ideal. The pick of Britain’s army, and of her navy, are diverted in the Crimea, and it is certain that no assistance could be rendered in India within a year. By then – we shall have supplanted England in southern Asia.”²⁹

“And it can begin without delay?” says the Tsar’s voice.

“Immediately, majesty. By the southern route, we can be at the Khyber, with every man, gun, and item of equipment, seven months from this night.” Ignatieff was almost striking an attitude, his tawny head thrown back, one hand on the table. They waited, silently, and I heard the Tsar sigh.

“So be it, then. Forgive us, gentlemen, for desiring to hear it in summary again, but it is a matter for second, and third thoughts, even after the resolve has been given.” He coughed, wearily. “All is approved, then – and the other items, with the exception of – yes, Item Ten. It can be referred to Omsk for further study. You have our leave, gentlemen.”

At this there was a scrape of chairs, and East was kicking at me, and jabbing a fìnger at the door behind us. I’d been so spellbound by our enormous discovery, I’d almost forgotten where we were – but, by gad, it was time we were no longer here. I edged back to the door, East crowding behind me, and then we heard Ignatieff’s voice again.

“Majesty, with permission. In connection with Item Seven – the Indian expedition – mention was made of possible diversionary schemes, to prevent by all means any premature discovery of our intentions. I mentioned, but did not elaborate, a plan for possibly deluding the enemy with a false scent.”

At this we stopped, crouched by the door. He went on:

“Plans have been prepared, but in no considerable detail, for a spurious expedition through your Alaskan province, aimed at the British North American possessions. It was thought that if these could be brought to the attention of the British Government, in a suitably accidental manner, they would divert the enemy’s attention from the eastern theatre entirely.”

“I don’t like it,” says Khruleff’s voice. “I have seen the plan, majesty; it is over-elaborate and unnecessary.”

“There are,” says Ignatieff, quite unabashed, “two British officers, at present confined in this house – prisoners from the Crimea whom I had brought here expressly for the purpose. It should not be beyond our wits to ensure that they discovered the false North American plan; thereafter they would obviously attempt to escape, to warn their government of it.”

“And then?” says Duhamel.

“They would succeed, of course. It is no distance to the Crimea – it would be arranged without their suspecting they were mere tools of our purpose. And their government would at least be distracted.”

“Too clever,” says Khruleff. “Playing at spies.”

“With submission, majesty,” says Ignatieff, “there would be no difficulty. I have selected these two men with care – they are ideal for our purpose. One is an agent of intelligence, taken at Silistria – a clever, dangerous fellow. Show him the hint of a design against his country, and he would fasten on it like a hawk. The other is a very different sort – a great, coarse bully of a man, all brawn and little brain; he has spent his time here lechering after every female he could find.” I felt East stiffen beside me, as we listened to this infernal impudence. “But he would be necessary – for even if we permitted, and assisted their escape here, and saw that they reached the Crimea in safety, they would still have to rejoin their army at Sevastopol, and we could hardly issue orders to our forces in Crimea to let them pass through. This second fellow is the kind of resourceful villain who would find a way.”

There was a silence, and then Duhamel says: “I must agree with Khruleff, majesty. It is not necessary, and might even be dangerous. The British are not fools; they smell a rat as soon as anyone. These false plans, these clever stratagems – they can excite suspicion and recoil on the plotter. Our Indus scheme is soundly based; it needs no pretty folly of this kind.”

“So.” The Tsar’s voice was a hoarse murmur. “The opinion is against you, Count. Let your British officers sleep undisturbed. But we thank you for your zeal in the matter, even so. And now, gentlemen, we have worked long enough –”

East was bundling me on to the dark landing before the voice had finished speaking. We closed the door gently, and tip-toed across towards our passage even as we heard the library doors opening down in the hall. I peeped round the corner; the Cossack was snoring away again, and we scuttled silently past him and into East’s room. I sank down, shaking, on to his bed, while he fumbled at the candle, muttering furiously till he got it lit. His face was as white as a sheet – but he remembered to muffle the mouth of the hidden speaking-tube with his pillow.

“My God, Flashman,” says he, when he had got his wind back. We were staring helplessly at each other. “What are we to do?”

“What can we do?” says I.

“We did hear aright – didn’t we?” says he. “They’re going for India – while our back’s turned? A Russian army over the Khyber – a rebellion! Good God – is the thing possible?”

I thought of ’42, and the Afghans – and what they could do with a Russian army to help them. “Aye,” says I. “It’s possible all right.”

“I knew we were right to watch and listen!” cries he. “I knew it! But I never dreamed – this is the most appalling thing!” He slapped his hands and paced about. “Look – we’ve got to do something! We’ve got to get away – somehow! They must have news of this at Sevastopol. Raglan’s there; he’s the commander – if we could get this to him, and London, there’d be time – to try to prepare, at least. Send troops out – increase the north-west garrisons – perhaps even an expedition into Persia, or Afghanistan –”

“There isn’t time,” says I. “You heard them – seven months from tonight they’ll be on the edge of the Punjab with thirty thousand men, and God knows how many Afghans ready to join in for a slap at us and the loot of India. It would take a month to get word to England, twice as long again to assemble an army – if that’s possible, which I doubt – and then it’s four months to India –”

“But that’s in time – just in time!” cries he. “If only we can get away – at once!”

“Well, we can’t,” says I. “The thing’s not possible.”

“We’ve got to make it possible!” says he, feverishly. “Look – look at this, will you?” And he snatched a book from his bureau: it was some kind of geography or guide, in Russian script – that hideous lettering that always made me think of black magic recipes for conjuring the Devil. “See here; this map. Now, I’ve pieced this together over the past few months, just by listening and using my wits, and I’ve a fair notion where we are, although Starotorsk ain’t shown on this map; too small. But I reckon we’re about here, in this empty space – perhaps fifty miles from Ekaterinoslav, and thirty from Alexandrovsk, see? It startled me, I tell you; I’d thought we were miles farther inland.”

“So did I,” says I. “You’re sure you’re right? – they must have brought me a hell of a long way round, then.”

“Of course – that’s their way! They’ll never do anything straight, I tell you. Confuse, disturb, upset – that’s their book of common prayer! But don’t you see – we’re not much above a hundred miles from the north end of the Crimea – maybe only a couple of hundred from Raglan at Sevastopol!”

“With a couple of Russian armies in between,” I pointed out. “Anyway, how could we get away from here?”

“Steal a sled at night – horses. If we went fast enough, we could get changes at the post stations on the way, as long as we kept ahead of pursuit. Don’t you see, man – it must be possible!” His eyes were shining fiercely. “Ignatieff was planning for us to do this very thing! My God, why did they turn him down! Think of it – if he had had his way, they’d be helping us to escape with their bogus information, never dreaming we had the real plans! Of all the cursed luck!”

“Well, they did turn him down,” says I. “And it’s no go. You talk of stealing a sled – how far d’you think we’d get, with Pencherjevsky’s Cossacks on our tail? You can’t hide sleigh-tracks, you know – not on land as flat as your hat. Even if you could, they know exactly where we’d go – there’s only one route” – and I pointed at his map – “through the neck of the Crimean peninsula at – what’s it called? Armyansk. They’d overhaul us long before we got there.”

“No, they wouldn’t,” says he, grinning – the same sly, fag grin of fifteen years ago. “Because we won’t go that way. There’s another road to the Crimea – I got it from this book, but they’d never dream we knew of it. Look, now, old Flashy friend, and learn the advantages of studying geography. See how the Crimean peninsula is joined to mainland Russia – just a narrow isthmus, eh? Now look east a little way along the coast – what d’ye see?”

“A town called Yenitchi,” says I. “But if you’re thinking of pinching a boat, you’re mad –”

“Boat nothing,” says he. “What d’ye see in the sea, south of Yenitchi?”

“A streak of fly-dung,” says I, impatiently. “Now, Scud –”

“That’s what it looks like,” says he triumphantly. “But it ain’t. That, my boy, is the Arrow of Arabat – a causeway, not more than half a mile across, without even a road on it, that runs from Yenitchi a clear sixty miles through the sea of Azov to Arabat in the Crimea – and from there it’s a bare hundred miles across to Sevastopol! Don’t you see, man? No one ever uses it, according to this book, except a few dromedary caravans in summer. Why, the Russians hardly know it exists, even! All we need is one night of snow, here, to cover our traces, and while they’re chasing us towards the isthmus, we’re tearing down to Yenitchi, along the causeway to Arabat, and then westward ho to Sevastopol –”

“Through the bloody Russian army!” cries I.

“Through whoever you please! Can’t you see – no one will be looking for us there! They’ve no telegraph, anyway, in this benighted country – we both speak enough Russian to pass! Heavens, we speak it better than most moujiks, I’ll swear. It’s the way, Flashman – the only way!”

I didn’t like this one bit. Don’t misunderstand me – I’m as true-blue a Briton as the next man, and I’m not unwilling to serve the old place in return for my pay, provided it don’t entail too much discomfort or expense. But I draw the line where my hide is concerned – among the many things I’m not prepared to do for my country is die, especially at the end of a rope trailing from a Cossack’s saddle, or with his lance up my innards. The thought of abandoning this snug retreat, where I was feeding full, drinking well, and rogering my captivity happily away, and going careering off through the snow-fast Russian wilderness, with those devils howling after me – and all so that we could report this crazy scheme to Raglan! It was mad. Anyway, what did I care for India? I’d sooner we had it than the Russians, of course, and if the intelligence could have been conveyed safely to Raglan (who’d have promptly forgotten it, or sent an army to Greenland by mistake, like as not) I’d have done it like a shot. But I draw the line at risks that aren’t necessary to my own well-being. That’s why I’m eighty years old today, while Scud East has been mouldering underground at Cawnpore this forty-odd years.

But I couldn’t say this to him, of course. So I looked profound, and anxious, and shook my head. “Can’t be done, Scud. Look now; you don’t know much about this Arrow causeway, except what’s in that book. Who’s to say it’s open in winter – or that it’s still there? Might have been washed away. Who knows what guards they may have at either end? How do we get through the Crimea to Sevastopol? I’ve done a bit of travelling in disguise, you know, in Afghanistan and Germany … and, oh, lots of places, and it’s a sight harder than you’d think. And in Russia – where everyone has to show his damned ticket every few miles – we’d never manage it. But” – I stilled his protest with a stern finger – “I’d chance that, of course, if it wasn’t an absolute certainty that we’d be nabbed before we’d got halfway to this Yenitchi place. Even if we got clear away from here – which would be next to impossible – they would ride us down in few hours. It’s hopeless, you see.”

“I know that!” he cried. “I can count, too! But I tell you we’ve got to try! It’s a chance in a million that we’ve found out this infernal piece of Russian treachery! We must try to use it, to warn Raglan and the people at home! What have we got to lose, except our lives?”

D’you know, when a man talks like that to me, I feel downright insulted. Why other, unnamed lives, or the East India Company’s dividend, or the credit of Lord Aberdeen, or the honour of British arms, should be held by me to be of greater consequence than my own shrinking skin, I’ve always been at a loss to understand.

“You’re missing the point,” I told him. “Of course, one doesn’t think twice about one’s neck when it’s a question of duty” – I don’t, anyway – “but one has to be sure where one’s duty lies. Maybe I’ve seen more rough work than you have, Scud, and I’ve learned there’s no point in suicide – not when one can wait and watch and think. If we sit tight, who knows what chance may arise that ain’t apparent now? But if we go off half-cock, and get killed or something – well, that won’t get the news to Raglan. Here’s something: now that Ignatieff don’t need us any more, they may even exchange us. Then the laugh would be on them, eh?”

At this he cried out that time was vital, and we daren’t wait. I replied that we daren’t go until we saw a reasonable chance (if I knew anything, we’d wait a long time for one), and so we bandied it to and fro and got no forrarder, and finally went to bed, played out.

When I thought the thing over, alone (and got into a fine sweat at the recollection of the fearful risk we’d run, crouching in that musty gallery) I could see East’s point. Here we were, by an amazing fluke, in possession of information which any decent soldier would have gone through hell to get to his chiefs. And Scud East was a decent soldier, by anyone’s lights but mine. My task, plainly, was to prevent his doing anything rash – in other words, anything at all – and yet appear to be in as big a sweat as he was himself. Not too difficult, for one of my talents.

In the next few days we mulled over a dozen notions for escaping, each more lunatic than the last. It was quite interesting, really, to see at what point in some particular idiocy poor Scud would start to boggle; I remember the look of respectful horror which crept into his eyes when I regretted absently that we hadn’t dropped from the gallery that night and cut all their throats, the Tsar’s included – “too late, now, of course, since they’ve all gone,” says I. “Pity, though; if we’d finished ’em off, that would have scotched their little scheme. And I haven’t had a decent set-to since Balaclava. Aye, well.”

Scud began to worry me, though; he was working himself up into a fever of anxiety and impatience where he might do something foolish. “We must try!” he kept insisting. “If we can think of no alternative soon, we’re bound to make a run for it some night! I’ll go mad if we don’t, I tell you! How can you just sit there? – oh, no, I’m sorry, Flashman; I know this must be torturing you too! Forgive me, old fellow. I haven’t got your steady nerve.”

He hadn’t got Valla to refresh him, either, which might have had a calming effect. I thought of suggesting that he take a steam-bath with Aunt Sara, to settle his nerves, but he might have enjoyed it too much, and then gone mad repenting. So I tried to look anxious and frustrated, while he chewed his nails and fretted horribly, and a week passed, in which he must have lost a stone. Worrying about India, stab me. And then the worst happened: we got our opportunity, and in circumstances which even I couldn’t refuse.

It came after a day in which Pencherjevsky lost his temper, a rare thing, and most memorable. I was in the salon when I heard him bawling at the front door, and came out to find him standing in the hallway, fulminating at two fellows outside on the steps. One looked like a clergyman; the other was a lean, ugly little fellow dressed like a clerk.

“… effrontery, to seek to thrust yourself between me and my people!” Pencherjevsky was roaring. “Merciful God, how do I keep my hands from you? Have you no souls to cure, you priest fellow, and you, Blank, no pen-pushing or pimping to occupy you? Ah, but no – you have your agitating, have you not, you seditious scum! Well, agitate elsewhere, before I have my Cossacks take their whips to you! Get out of my sight and off my land – both of you!”

He was grotesque in his rage, towering like some bearded old-world god – I’d have been in the next county before him, but these two stood their ground, jeopardizing their health.

“We are no serfs of yours!” cries the fellow Blank. “You do not order us,” and Pencherjevsky gave a strangled roar and started forward, but the priest came between.

“Lord Count! A moment!” He was game, that one. “Hear me, I implore. You are a just man, and surely it is little enough to ask. The woman is old, and if she cannot pay the soul-tax on her grandsons, you know what will happen. The officials will block her stove, and she will be driven out – to what? To die in the cold, or to starve, and the little ones with her. It is a matter of only one hundred and seventy silver kopecks – I do not ask you to pay for her, but let me find the money, and my friend here. We will be glad to pay! Surely you will let us – be merciful!”

“Look you,” says Pencherjevsky, holding himself in. “Do I care for a handful of kopecks? No! Not if it was a hundred and seventy thousand roubles, either! But you come to me with a pitiful tale of this old crone, who cannot pay the tax on her brats – do I not know her son – worthless bastard! – is a koulak^q in Odessa, and could pay it for her, fifty times over! Well, let him! But if he will not, then it is for the government to enforce the law – no man hindering! No, not even me! Suppose I pay, or permit you to pay, on her behalf, what would happen then? I shall tell you. Next year, and every year thereafter, you would have all the moujiks from here to Rostov bawling at my door: ‘We cannot pay the soul-tax,³⁰ batiushka; pay for us, as you paid for so-and-so.’ And where does that end?”

“But –” the priest was beginning, but Pencherjevsky cut him short.

“You would tell me that you will pay for them all? Aye, Master Blank there would pay – with the filthy money sent by his Communist friends in Germany! So that he could creep among my moujiks, sowing sedition, preaching revolution! I know him! So get him hence, priest, out of my sight, before I forget myself!”

“And the old woman, then? Have a little pity, Count!”

“I have explained!” roars Pencherjevsky. “By God, as though I owe you that much! Get out, both of you!”

He advanced, hands clenched, and the two of them went scuttling down the steps. But the fellow Blank³¹ had to have a last word:

“You filthy tyrant! You dig your own grave! You and your kind think you can live forever, by oppression and torture and theft – you sow dragon’s teeth with your cruelty, and they will grow to tear you! You will see, you fiend!”

Pencherjevsky went mad. He flung his cap on the ground, foaming, and then ran bawling for his whip, his Cossacks, his sabre, while the two malcontents scampered off for their lives, Blank screaming threats and abuse over his shoulder. I listened with interest as the Count raved and stormed:

“After them! I’ll have that filthy creature knouted, God help me! Run him down, and don’t leave an inch of hide on his carcase!”

Within a few moments a group of his Cossacks were in the saddle and thundering out of the gate, while he stormed about the hall, raging still:

“The dog! The insolent garbage! To beard me, at my own door! The priest’s a meddling fool – but that Blank! Anarchist swine! He’ll be less impudent when my fellows have cut the buttocks off him!”

He stalked away, finally, still cursing, and about an hour later the Cossacks came back, and their leader stumped up the steps to report. Pencherjevsky had simmered down a good deal by this time; he had ordered a brew of punch, and invited East and myself to join him, and we were sipping at the scalding stuff by the hall fire when the Cossack came in, an old, stout, white-whiskered scoundrel with his belt at the last hole.³² He was grinning, and had his nagaika in his hand.

“Well?” growled Pencherjevsky. “Did you catch that brute and teach him manners?”

“Aye, batiushka,” says the Cossack, well pleased. “He’s dead. Thirty cuts – and, pouf! He was a weakling, though.”

“Dead, you say?” Pencherjevsky set down his cup abruptly, frowning. Then he shrugged: “Well, good riddance! No one’ll mourn his loss. One anarchist more or less will not trouble the prefect.”

“The fellow Blank escaped,” continued the Cossack. “I’m sorry, batiushka –”

“Blank escaped!” Pencherjevsky’s voice came out in a hoarse scream, his eyes dilating. “You mean – it was the priest you killed! The holy man!” He stared in disbelief, crossing himself. “Slava Bogu!^r The priest!”

“Priest? Do I know?” says the Cossack. “Was it wrong, batiushka?”

“Wrong, animal? A priest! And you … you flogged him to death!” The Count looked as though he would have a seizure. He gulped, and clawed at his beard, and then he blundered past the Cossack, up the stairs, and we heard his door crash behind him.

“My God!” says East. The Cossack looked at us in wonder, and then shrugged, as his kind will, and stalked off. We just stood, looking at each other.

“What will this mean?” says East.

“Search me,” I said. “They butcher each other so easily in this place – I don’t know. I’d think flogging a priest to death is a trifle over the score, though – even for Russia. Old man Pencherjevsky’ll have some explaining to do, I’d say – shouldn’t wonder if they kick him out of the Moscow Carlton Club.”

“My God, Flashman!” says East again. “What a country!”

We didn’t see the Count at dinner, nor Valla, and Aunt Sara was uncommunicative. But you could see in her face, and the servants’, and feel in the very air of the house, that Starotorsk was a place appalled. For once East forgot to talk about escaping, and we went to bed early, saying good-night in whispers.

I didn’t rest too easy, though. My stove was leaking, and making the room stuffy, and the general depression must have infected me, for when I dozed I dreamed badly. I got my old nightmare of drowning in the pipe at Jotunberg, probably with the stove fumes,³³ and then it changed to that underground cell in Afghanistan, where my old flame, Narreeman, was trying to qualify me for the Harem Handicap, and then someone started shooting outside the cell, and shrieking, and suddenly I was awake, lathered with sweat, and the shooting was real, and from beneath me in the house there was an appalling crash and the roar of Pencherjevsky’s voice, and a pattering of feet, and by that time I was out of bed and into my breeches, struggling with my boots as I threw open the door.

East was in the passage, half-dressed like myself, running for the landing. I reached it on his very heels, crying: “What’s happening? What the devil is it?”, when there was a terrible shriek from Valla’s passage, and Pencherjevsky was bounding up the stairs, bawling over his shoulder to the Cossacks whom I could see in the hall below:

“Hold them there! Hold the door! My child, Valentina! Where are you?”

“Here, father!” And she came hurrying in her nightgown, hair all disordered, eyes starting with terror. “Father, they are everywhere – in the garden! I saw them – oh!”

There was a crash of musket-fire from beyond the front door, splinters flew in the hall, and one of the Cossacks sang out and staggered, clutching his leg. The others were at the hall windows, there was a smashing of glass, and the sound of baying, screaming voices from outside. Pencherjevsky swore, clasped Valla to him with one enormous arm, saw us, and bawled above the shooting:

“That damned priest! They have risen – the serfs have risen! They’re attacking the house!”

a Peasants.

b Renegades.

c Leader.

d Father.

e Cossack whip.

f Pardon, father, I am guilty.

g Very well.

h Lady.

i Press for crushing feet.

j Village assembly.

k Gig.

l Porter.

m See Royal Flash.

n Slavery.

o Sheepskin coat.

p Company, band.

q A peasant with money, a usurer.

r Glory to God!