Extract:
THE DRUMS sounded out the remorseless beat of the pas de charge. This was it. The Guard, ‘the Immortals,’ had never failed. One final push, and the battle would be theirs. For the third time that day Wellington and his men stood face to face with Defeat. But this time, Janus-like, she stared the Emperor in the face as well.
Karelius glanced at his watch. Almost five-and-twenty minutes after seven o’clock. And here came the magnificent French. Moving briskly, but not running, a glittering army of every colour, royal blue predominating, eagle-standards and Tricolours aloft, trumpeters blaring out their message of defiance amidst the din and smoke of battle. Thousand upon thousand of the Emperor’s best men, seasoned in conflict since the days of Marengo and Austerlitz. Down the southern slope they marched, to the valley floor. And without hesitation, up the ridge of Mont St Jean. A rum-a-tum-tum. A-rum-a-tum-tum. As they came under fire from grape and canister they were not deterred, but marched steadily on, through their dead and dying. And still came the cries of ‘En avant!’ ‘Vive l’Empereur!’ A-rum-a-tum-tum. A rum-a-tum-tum.
Karelius was seized with a curious conviction. The sudden and certain knowledge that this was the end. This was it. Not only the conclusion of the battle, nor even of the war, but the end of the whole manner of warfare, even the whole world, that they represented. Never again would gaudily-uniformed troops advance in column beneath the Tricolour; never again would men cry ‘Vive l’Empereur!’ as they flourished their eagle-standards; never again would the fate of nations be decided upon a battlefield less than a couple of miles square. Never again. In future, even the near future, every man out there would have become a magnificent anachronism, part of a pageant as colourful and out-of-date as the knights and archers of Agincourt. Yet still they came. A rum-a-tum-tum. A-rum-a tum-tum.
It was the Emperor’s last throw of the dice, but surely a winning one. Not only were the Guard élite troops, but fresh, thrown against the remnants of the crippled and exhausted polyglot allied infantry. The odds were massively in their favour. The only fresh allied troops were the light cavalry, kept in reserve all day: the dragoons of Vandeleur, and Vivian’s hussars. And now, surely, they would be ordered into action.
And so they were. ‘Erste Husaren!’ Karelius heard the order. ‘Stehen bereit!’
For the last time he checked his equipment, more for something to do to calm his nerves than anything else. Saddle, harness and reins, stirrups, the sword which would be his principal weapon strapped to his right wrist, pistol tucked in his belt. He glanced from side to side. Grüner was ahead of him, Williams a short distance to his left. Despite his long experience of war this would be his first encounter with the formidable Imperial Guard. As, assuredly, it would be his last.
Unwelcome thoughts crowded into his head. Charlotte in tears … How his mother would hear the news … Renate, and the father she was just getting to know. His sortie into Smohain had been spontaneous; there had been little time to think. But this charge had been on his mind all day.
The 10th Hussars were first to move, with Hammond and his commander Major Howard in the van. Then it was the turn of the First Germans. Grüner raised his sword, glanced behind and yelled. For the final time, Karelius clipped his heels under his mount, the game but temperamental Surrey, and urged him forward. Yet again Williams was at his side.
‘This is it, then,’ said the young officer, with a twisted grin.
Karelius nodded, and gave a sideways nod. ‘Muck or nettles, as they say up north.’
They urged their mounts into the trot. The rye-field before them had long been trodden flat, poached and rutted by pounding hoofs and artillery wheels. Downhill, but not too fast, or the horses could stumble. Into the canter; beneath him he felt the familiar rhythm of the pounding of his horse’s hoofs. The Middle Guard were nearer: the colour, the noise, and awaiting death. The cries of ‘Vive l’Empereur!’ were louder still. Ahead, glittering swords were brandished aloft as the 10th Hussars smashed into the column at full tilt. Fifty yards to go; Karelius could see the French in detail; the vieux moustaches and bearskins of the best troops in the Army of the North. Twenty yards. This was it. Karelius raised an arm, his comrades’ pace increased beside him, and for the final time in their distinguished history the light cavalry of the King’s German Legion went into action.