That afternoon the Emperor sent to enquire after Roger. From time to time, his friends on the Staff came to visit him and he learned something from them of the progress of the war, although it had again become a most complicated picture.
The three armies opposed to the French now greatly outnumbered them, but the weakness of the Allies was that their forces, which roughly formed a semi-circle east of the Elbe, were widely separated. One army covered Berlin, while the others were in Silesia and Bohemia. Napoleon, in accordance with his habitual strategy, aimed to concentrate his army and defeat each in turn before they could join forces against him; but his plans were seriously bedevilled by the fact that since he was operating in hostile country he could secure no reliable information about the whereabouts of his enemies.
His strongest card was that, owing to his unique reputation as a General, all the Allied Commanders were frightened of him. Bernadotte had been one of the ablest Marshals, yet he had no confidence at all in his own ability to defeat his old master, so kept his Swedes well to the rear of the battle zone. Schwarzenberg, who was technically Commander-in-Chief of all the Allied forces, was an able diplomat but a craven soldier, and became scared out of his wits every time he heard that Napoleon was approaching. Barclay de Tolly had, again and again, perhaps wisely, scurried off with his army rather than stand and fight during the French advance to Moscow in the previous year; and the other Russian Generals were equally cagey about taking on the redoubtable Corsican. Old Blücher and his Prussians alone showed a determination to lose no opportunity of attacking the enemy, but the veteran was too shrewd to take the offensive with his limited forces unless he could be assured of the support of the Russians and Austrians.
This fear of Napoleon by the majority of the Allied Generals did not prove altogether to his advantage, since although it enabled him to move the bulk of his army wherever he wished, every time he advanced against one of the enemy armies it withdrew. The result was that he was constantly exhausting his troops by long marches in most evil weather, without being able to bring any of his opponents to engage in a pitched battle. For the remainder of September, during which there was hardly a day upon which it did not rain, he forced the pace in desperate efforts to catch up with and defeat one of the Allied forces, only to hear that another was again threatening Dresden, so was forced to break off the pursuit and change direction in order to protect his base.
By the end of the month Roger was able to get about on crutches, but for him to have ridden any distance would have been certain to re-open his wound, so he began to contemplate the possibility of hiring a coach and leaving the city clandestinely one night. But once more his plans were frustrated. The Emperor’s Chief-of-Staff, Marshal Berthier, Prince de Neufchâtel, happened to hear that he was able to get about again, so sent for him.
As Roger was that comparatively rare product, a beau sabreur who also had brains, during periods when Napoleon had not been engaged in active operations he had of tent lent him for a while to Berthier; so he was well acquainted with the Chief-of-Staff, and the complicated work for which he was responsible.
The Prince, an ugly little man with an enormous head that held a card index brain; he was most unpopular and ill-tempered but, recognising Roger’s capabilities, had always been polite to him, and he now explained that he was in the devil of a mess.
The constant changes of direction by the Emperor and the other widely scattered French forces, were making it near-impossible to carry out his task of re-routing supply columns and keeping a record of units available, together with their whereabouts; so Roger’s help would prove invaluable. His request, as the senior Marshal in the Emperor’s army, was tantamount to an order so, for the ten days that followed, Roger had to labour for hours on end, working out statistics from maps and schedules.
Meanwhile, Blücher, inspired by Gneisenau and encouraged by both his King and the Czar, had determined on a flank march which would enable him to join up with Schwarzenberg’s Austrians, south of Leipzig. A few days later the Emperor, hearing that the Prussians had crossed the Elbe, charged Murat with the defence of Leipzig and St. Cyr once more with that of Dresden, then hurried north-west, hoping to crush his most inveterate enemy while on the march and encumbered by his baggage. Having sent Ney forward to fall on the rear of Blücher’s army, Napoleon waited further news for four days in the dank, fogbound castle of Duben. When it came he learned that Blücher had turned westward, thus disclosing his intention of joining Schwarzenberg.
Promptly the Emperor devised a new plan to disconcert his enemies. The great fortresses on the Elbe were all still in his hands; he would march to the Elbe and cross it. But the whole of his Staff considered this so reckless that they confronted him in a body and begged him to abandon this idea. Reluctantly he agreed, but only to substitute the still more venturesome design of first crushing Bernadotte, then crossing the Elbe at Torgan and circling round to strike at Schwarzenberg near Leipzig.
Had his men been tireless machines, this might have been possible, but for two months they had been marching and counter-marching, for a good part of the time in pouring rain. Their uniforms were sodden, their boots worn out and, owing to insufficient supplies to feed them, they were suffering from semi-starvation.
The Emperor had gained a great victory at Dresden, but his Marshals had been defeated in five major battles: at Grossbeeren, Hagelsberg, Katzbach, Kulm and Dennewitz. At the beginning of the campaign he had commanded half a million men but, mainly through his own ill-conceived strategy, frittered away over half of them. The hospitals were crammed, tens of thousands were suffering from minor wounds. Utter weariness and a spirit of despair now permeated the whole army.
By October 10th he had been forced to the conclusion that he dared take no further risks and now, if he were to save Leipzig, even abandon the middle Elbe in order to concentrate all his forces in the neighbourhood of that city. On the 11th, Berthier received orders to move the Imperial Headquarters to Leipzig, and a frantic packing of documents began.
During each of the past few days Roger had spent from a quarter to half an hour on a quiet horse, but he had not yet dared trot, and it was obviously out of the question for him to make the eighty-mile journey on horseback. In consequence he arranged to travel in one of the Mess carts, a small, two-wheeled, covered wagon.
All through the night and the following day the long columns of silent, depressed troops made their way westward and, late in the evening of the 12th, Roger reached the city to find that Berthier had taken over a Saxon noble’s palace as a headquarters. Knowing that his leg wound pained him when going upstairs, one of Roger’s brother officers had kindly reserved for him a large clothes closet on the first floor, and had a bed put in it. Tired out after his long journey, he pulled off his clothes, tumbled into bed and was almost instantly asleep.
On the 14th the Emperor arrived, bringing with him the unfortunate King and Queen of Saxony, whom for so long he had dragged at his chariot wheels while almost totally destroying what had once been their fair realm. With him, too, he brought the worst of news, which he had received a few days earlier. His hitherto most loyal ally, the King of Bavaria, had defected and entered into a pact with Austria that, in exchange for his putting thirty-six thousand troops at her disposal, she would guarantee a continuance of his sovereignty.
Having left the Saxon sovereigns at their palace, Napoleon pressed on to Wachau, a village about three miles to the south-west of the city, at which Murat had his headquarters. It was the central point opposite the arc from east to south where the allies had massed their main forces. Murat was superior to them only in cavalry, and his gloomy report conveyed the fact that he had not used it with his old dash and ability. The fact was that he was utterly sick of the war, and thought only of how soon he could get back to his Kingdom of Naples.
A similar spirit was displayed that evening by the other Marshals when the Emperor summoned them to a conference at the village of Reudnitz. Among others he bitterly reproached Augereau for no longer being the intrepid leader he had been at the battle of Castiglione; to which the Marshal replied with equal bitterness, ‘Give me back the old soldiers of our Italian campaign, and I’ll show you that I am.’
But Napoleon himself was not the man he had been, otherwise he would not have let the 15th drift by without taking any action, thus giving the Allies an extra day to complete their concentration. During that time Schwarzenberg was able to send a Corps across the rivers Pleisse and Elster in order to threaten Leipzig from the direction of Lindenau on the south-west and also, with new divisions that came up, extend the right of his semicircle.
That night Marmont, whose corps was stationed in the northern suburbs, reported watchfires, indicating that yet another enemy army was mustered there. Actually it was Blücher’s Prussians, but the Emperor refused to believe his Marshal’s warning of this new threat and, continuing to suppose that his only serious danger lay in the south-east, ordered Marmont to be ready to march his troops through Leipzig to support the attack he intended to launch against Schwarzenberg.
Thus, on the morning of October 16th, when the Battle of the Nations opened, one hundred and fifty thousand weary and dispirited troops—all that remained to Napoleon—were opposed to three hundred thousand enemies determined to destroy him and ready to advance simultaneously from the south, east and north of the city.
The Emperor’s forces were disposed on a convex front centred on Liebertwolkwitz, immediately to the east of the city. The enemy were stretched over a much wider arc, so he counted on being able to equal their numbers at any point; and, having driven Schwarzenberg’s army from the field in disruption, deal later with Blücher and Bernadotte about whose positions he was still in ignorance.
Berthier and the rest of the Staff had left the city to join Napoleon at his battle headquarters. As Roger was still unable to ride either fast or for any distance, he would have been useless as an A.D.C.; so, considerably relieved at having a valid excuse to escape the hazards of the battle, he remained behind.
Having breakfasted, he painfully climbed the stairs to the attics of the palace, found a skylight and crawled through on to the roof. From that height, with his spy glass he could get a good view of the greater part of the country surrounding the city.
At nine o’clock the opening shots were fired by the Allies from the heights they held opposite Liebertwolkwitz, and these were followed by a furious artillery duel that lasted for six hours. The Emperor then launched the two cavalry corps of Latour-Maubourg and Pajol. Led by Murat, these twelve thousand charging horsemen provided an amazing spectacle. They scaled the muddy slopes, sabred the gunners and enveloped the Russian squares. So deep was their penetration that the three Allied sovereigns who had been watching the battle from an eminence were forced to beat a hasty retreat. But Murat had forced the pace too early. His horses and men had not the stamina left to resist the counter charges by Pahlen’s Cossacks and the Silesian Curassiers. The French were driven back in confusion, with the loss of both their Corps commanders.
Meanwhile, an Austrian attack on Lindenau had been beaten off, but on the west side of the city, at Möckern, the French received a most unpleasant surprise. In accordance with Napoleon’s orders, Marmont had begun to move south when he was suddenly attacked by Yorck’s Prussians. Ney’s corps should have supported Marmont, but was also on the move. Berthier sent a confused order for Ney to turn about, with the result that his fifteen thousand men spent the greater part of the day marching to and fro without participating in the battle, and arrived too late to help Marmont. He defended Möckern with great determination, and it proved the most bloody engagement of the whole war, ending by the French being driven out and left with greatly reduced numbers to endeavour to check Blücher’s advance from the north.
During the day the French had inflicted more casualties on the enemy than they had sustained, but they had lost at least twenty thousand men and had no means of replacing them. St. Cyr’s corps of twenty-seven thousand men was far away at Dresden, and Davout’s army, which had been strained to the limit in holding down north-west Germany, was still further away in Hanover; whereas Bennigsen was now rapidly approaching with the Russian Army of Reserve, numbering forty-one thousand men, and the ultra-cautious Bernadotte had belatedly begun to march south from Halle with his sixty thousand Swedes.
On the following day, a Sunday, the general gloom in Leipzig was added to by the Saxons and other German troops, under General Reynier, becoming disaffected and threatening to desert; also by pouring rain. Experience had shown during this awful autumn campaign that in such weather infantry became almost useless, because the powder for their muskets could not be kept dry. This may have been one reason why the battle was not renewed but, in Napoleon’s case, the malaise and indecision which had recently afflicted him played a part. Instead of planning a break-out, he spent most of his time dozing, then decided to send the captured Austrian General, Merveldt, to his Emperor with proposals for an armistice. But at last the Allies were beginning to realise that Napoleon was not invincible, and that now was their chance to make an end of him; so no reply was sent.
On learning that Blücher had now advanced far enough from the north-west to threaten the only French line of retreat, the Emperor instead of taking time by the forelock and ordering a retreat to start that night, merely directed that his drenched and famished troops should withdraw nearer the city. He then fell asleep.
Next morning, the 18th, the Allies launched a general offensive. Again Roger went up to the roof of the palace and watched the battle. From the south-west right round to the north-west, the city was ringed by over a thousand flashing guns. Cohorts of cavalry and great masses of infantry were pressing forward on every side but, as on the Saturday, clouds of dense smoke soon hid most of the fighting. Later in the day he learned that at Paunsdorf, to the north-east, the Allies had broken through the ring of the defence, owing to three thousand Saxons having gone over to the Russians and taking with them nineteen guns which they promptly turned on the hated French.
By evening Roger decided that the battle was now irretrievably lost and that, for him, it was time to go. His friend having had a bed put up for him in a clothes closet now proved a piece of unexpected good fortune as, on his hazardous way up to Hamburg, civilian clothing would protect him from stray bands of Germans. When he tried on some of the clothes, he found that they had all been made for a man a few inches shorter than himself and much fatter; but that could not be helped. He chose two cloth suits, some shirts and other garments, packed them, with his own possessions, into a portmanteau and hobbled downstairs with it.
Berthier had left all the headquarters transport in the palace stables, and the Mess cart in which Roger had travelled from Dresden was among it. The name of the man who had driven it was Dopet. Routing him out from among his fellow drivers, Roger said he had been ordered to leave the city at once with certain important papers, to ensure that they should not fall into the hands of the enemy; then had him put the portmanteau in the Mess cart.
Accompanied by Dopet, he went to the kitchen and collected ample stores for the journey. Next, he secured two muskets and a good supply of ammunition from the guardhouse. Finally, while Dopet harnessed a stout little cob between the shafts of the cart, Roger made himself a comfortable seat in the back from half a truss of hay. Then they set off into the semi-dark streets which resembled an oasis in an inferno, as on the outskirts of the city there were constant explosions and many houses in the suburbs were on fire.
Under Roger’s direction they reached the bridges to the west of Leipzig. Only in that quarter was there now no fighting in progress, but considerable numbers of men were crossing the river. Roger guessed that they were deserters, and in fact they were only anticipating the Emperor’s order given to Berthier a few hours later that night, that the whole army should retreat.
Later Roger learned that he had been lucky to get out of Leipzig when he had, as during the night the bridges became ever more crowded and on the following morning it was only with difficulty that a way was made for the Emperor’s coach. By then all that was left of his army was converging from south, east and north on to the one road leading west. The narrow streets of Leipzig were half blocked by abandoned guns and wagons. Between them squeezed solid masses of panic-stricken troops, breathlessly fighting their way toward the bridges. Hundreds of bursting cannon-balls, coming from three directions, added to the horror and confusion. Dead and wounded alike were trampled on by those still capable of making a desperate attempt to escape from that inferno. Many buildings were on fire, and in the suburbs Austrians, Russians, Prussians, Swedes and Saxons drove the wretched French from building to building, until tens of thousands of them had been forced out of the city in helpless herds.
The bridges were hopelessly inadequate for such masses to cross except in a comparative trickle. Early in the day the situation was still worsened by one bridge collapsing and another—the largest—being prematurely blown up owing to an error by a nervous Sapper. In desperation the fleeing host sought to escape by swimming the river. There followed a scene reminiscent of the crossing of the Beresina during the retreat from Moscow the previous winter. Hundreds of missiles exploded in the water and on both banks, creating a holocaust. Thousands of men were killed and thousands of others caught up in a tangle of bodies, and drowned.
Among the latter was the gallant Prince Poniatowski who for so many years had loyally led his Polish division in Napoleon’s battles, vainly clinging to the faithless Corsican’s promise that in due course he would restore Poland as an independent Kingdom. The Prince’s death was the more tragic in that, only the previous day, Napoleon had made him a Marshal.
During those terrible twenty-four hours that saw the final defeat and utter rout of the great army that Napoleon had mustered in Germany early that summer, Roger succeeded in getting well clear of the battle area and the early deserters who had crossed the bridges the previous evening, as he had. They naturally took the roads to the south, hoping to reach the Rhine and the protection of the many French-held fortresses along it; whereas Roger’s destination was Hamburg, so he had Dopet take a byroad leading north-west.
By morning they had covered some twenty miles and when full daylight came he decided that they must give the little cob several hours’ rest. The most likely way of avoiding dangerous encounters was to spend the time in a wood, so when they next came to a track leading into one, he told Dopet to drive up it. At a brook they watered the animal, fed it, ate a meal, then made themselves as comfortable as they could in the Mess cart.
About midday they roused and had another meal. During it Roger told Dopet that they were going to Hamburg, so would have to pass through country where they were almost certain to run into bands of German irregulars. He then opened the suitcase, showed Dopet the two civilian suits, and said, ‘We are going to change into these, then we can pass as Germans. That is, provided you don’t open your mouth. I speak German quite fluently enough to be taken in these parts for a Rhinelander, so if we are challenged, I think we should get by without trouble.’
Dopet was a sturdy, unimaginative young Fleming, and although he would have much preferred to travel south rather than north, he had been in the Army long enough to know that one did not argue with officers. When they had changed, both showed amusement at the other’s appearance. Dopet being shorter than Roger his trousers were the right length, but he had powerful shoulders, so when he struggled into the coat it burst at one of the seams; while Roger’s coat fitted fairly well, but his trousers were absurdly short. They got over the fact that the owner of the clothes had had a large paunch by folding the slack under tightened belts. However, their appearance was a matter of no great concern, as they were not attempting to pass as persons of quality, and at that date clothes were so scarce in Germany that those they were wearing might easily have been bought second-hand.
Having packed their uniforms in the suitcase, they set off, and by late afternoon had covered another fifteen miles. They then rested again for several hours in the neck of a wood. From a map Roger had brought with him, he knew that the little town of Sangerhausen lay some twelve miles ahead, and he wanted to pass through it during the hours of darkness; so at about one o’clock in the morning they took the road again. Well before five o’clock they were clear of the sleeping town and, a few miles beyond it, settled on another suitable spot for a long rest.
By moving from Dresden to Leipzig Roger had reduced his distance from Hamburg by about fifty miles, and now they had come another fifty; but they still had a hundred and fifty to cover and, anxious as he was to reach Hamburg, he felt that the utmost that could be expected of the little cob that drew the Mess cart was twenty-five miles a day.
Since he had been used, when on an urgent matter, to ride a hundred or more miles a day, he found this slow pace terribly frustrating. Yet there was no alternative. Even if he could have secured a horse, he would not have dared ride at more than walking pace with his terribly torn leg only recently healed. Walking beside the cart, for a good part of each day while Dopet led the cob, was better for his leg.
While he limped along, he became ever more depressed at the probable outcome of his journey. Admittedly, he had never known one of Georgina’s predictions about the future fail to come to pass, yet fundamentally her vision of Charles was absurd, because whatever crime Charles had committed, he was an officer and if he were condemned to death, he would not be hanged but shot. Yet, adoring Georgina as he did, how could he possibly not have volunteered to undertake this forlorn hope of changing the course of Charles’s fortune by getting him back to England? He could only console himself by the thought that, having spent three months journeying from one end of Europe to the other, in another few days he would have done all he could and at last learn if Charles was already dead or still alive.
As they slowly wound their way northward they met other travellers with some of whom Roger discussed the war. The news of Napoleon’s crushing defeat at the Battle of the Nations had sped ahead of them, and the inhabitants of every German village were wild with delight. Here and there they were passed by bands of irregulars, all now marching south, with the hope of joining in the pursuit of the broken French.
It was not until they reached Brunswick that they saw any French troops at all. But the city was an important junction so Davout still kept a strong garrison there, and the citizens were clearly overawed by the groups of surly-looking Grenadiers who patrolled the main streets or lounged, silent and unhappy, in the cafés.
While working with Berthier, Roger had frequently heard Davout’s position discussed. After the retreat from Moscow, the Emperor had made him Governor of the Lower Elbe, and instructed him to turn Hamburg into an impregnable fortress from which, in conjunction with their Danish allies, he could hold down the whole of north-west Germany.
No choice for such a task could have been better than the ‘Iron Marshal’, as Davout, Prince d’Eckmühl and Duc d’Auerstâdt, was called by the Army. He was the only Marshal who had studied and understood Napoleon’s revolutionary methods of warfare, so was a very formidable soldier. He was also an able administrator, completely ruthless and the strictest of disciplinarians.
In Napoleon’s two bids, earlier in the year, to take Berlin, he had hoped that Davout might come to the assistance of Ney and Oudinot. That he had been unable to do, because his limited forces were already stretched to the utmost putting down patriotic risings in Hanover, Mecklenburg and Brunswick; but he had carried out his assignment regarding Hamburg with an iron hand. The whole of Germany being in a state of semi-starvation, to conserve his supplies he had first forcibly evacuated three thousand children; then, also as useless mouths, all the elderly people in the city. To reduce to a minimum secret subscriptions by citizens to patriotic societies and subversive movements, he had inflicted taxes on the wealthy that had reduced them to near poverty, and imprisoned many of the leading merchants as hostages. His dread tribunals sat daily, and sent to execution anyone found guilty of having offended against even his minor ordinances.
The state of gloom and terror existing in the great port on the Elbe had been confirmed by several Germans to whom Roger had recently spoken; so when, on October 27th, he came in sight of the city spires, he knew how matters stood there, but he did not intend to enter the city. Some three miles outside the walls he had Dopet turn into a coppice and there the two of them changed from their ill-fitting civilian clothes back into uniform. They then took a side road to Herrenhausen, which lay just outside the city. Near it stood an ancient castle that, until the end of the past century, had been the residence of the sovereigns of Great Britain when they visited their Kingdom of Hanover. It was there that Davout had had his headquarters in 1810 when, before the Russian campaign, he had been commanding in Hamburg and Roger had been sent to him on a mission.
It was soon after midday when the Mess cart, now driven by Dopet and with Roger riding in it, pulled up outside the great gate of the castle. As Roger got out of the cart the sentry came smartly to attention and presented arms. Roger’s surmise that Davout had again made the place his headquarters proved correct. The sergeant of the guard sent a man to show Dopet where to stable his cob and cart, and another to escort Roger up to the Marshal Prince’s quarters.
Having announced himself as Colonel Comte de Breuc to an adjutant there, Roger learned that Davout had ridden in to the city that morning, but was expected back to dinner. Deciding to put his necessary wait to good advantage, Roger asked to be conducted to the department that dealt with officer prisoners-of-war. He was taken to a room in one of the towers, where a sergeant was shuffling through some papers. Duly impressed by Roger’s sash, which proclaimed him to be an A.D.C. to the Emperor, the sergeant hastened to produce a ledger and he was soon able to tell Roger that Charles was a prisoner with some hundred other officers at Schloss Bergedorf, which was some ten miles distant.
Immensely relieved to learn that Charles was still alive, and at having at last run his quarry to earth, Roger went down the spiral stairs, enquired the whereabouts of the anteroom to the Marshal’s office, and sat down there to await his return.
The wait was a long one, but at about half-past four Davout, grim-faced as ever, came striding in, his spurs clinking and his riding boots resounding on the parquet. Roger promptly stood up, came to attention and saluted.
Halting abruptly, the Marshal gave him an unsmiling stare and asked, ‘What brings you here, Breuc?’
‘I come, Your Highness, from His Imperial Majesty,’ Roger replied.
Davout motioned toward his office. ‘Come in then, and give me such news as you have of him.’
When Roger had followed him in and been waved to a chair, he said, ‘Alas, Your Highness, I can tell you no more than that I last saw the Emperor in Leipzig shortly before disaster overtook our army. But I have a warrant from him that he ordered me to present to you.’
As he spoke, Roger produced the paper he had obtained from Napoleon, ordering that Charles should be handed over to him, and placed it on Davout’s desk.
Passing a hand over his bald head, the Marshal read it through quickly, then asked, ‘What is the reason for this? Why does the Emperor wish me to transfer the custody of this young Englishmen to you?’
‘Because I have a special interest in him, Your Highness. As you may know, my mother was English, and this youth is my nephew. The Emperor graciously agreed that, if possible, I should be allowed to make arrangements for him to be sent back to England, on condition that he did not serve actively again in the war against us.’
Davout frowned. ‘I am most strongly opposed to sentiment being allowed to interfere with war. You should be engaged on your proper duties instead of travelling many miles to secure the release of a relative who is an enemy. However, that is not in my jurisdiction, and the Emperor’s command must be obeyed. I will find out where this officer is being held prisoner.’
‘While awaiting your return I took the liberty of doing so, Your Highness. He is at Schloss Bergedorf.’
‘Schloss Bergedorf!’ repeated Davout, with a sudden lift of his grey eyebrows. ‘Then he may no longer be there. Some days ago, when the prisoners at the Schloss learned of our defeat at Leipzig, they got out of hand. There was a mutiny. Several were shot, but twenty-seven broke prison and escaped.’
Roger went pale. He swallowed hard, then gasped, ‘Do you … do you know if St. Ermins was among them?’
The Marshal’s face took on a vicious look and his voice was almost a snarl. ‘No, I do not. But one thing I do know. I have given orders that any of the escapers who are recaptured are to be hanged.’
‘Hanged!’ Roger came to his feet. ‘But you can’t do that! Even if you condemn them to death, which would be unjustifiably severe, they are officers, so they have the right to be shot.’
‘Silence!’ Davout snapped. ‘Who are you that you should dare to tell me my business? To hold down these German curs is the hardest task I have ever had. Officers they may be, but they are Germans and, until recently, our allies. By turning their coats they have become traitors. The penalty of a traitor who is caught is to be hanged, and this will serve as a warning to any of their compatriots who are my prisoners and tempted to make trouble.’
‘I pray to God then that none of those who escaped will be recaptured.’
‘Then you’ll pray in vain,’ the Marshal retorted harshly. ‘Nine of them were recaptured this morning. They will be given a few hours to see priests if they wish, and make known their last wishes. But before sunset they will be dancing at the end of ropes.’