The Spanish Bride

2

From the window of the cottage which had for so long been the Smiths’ quarters, Juana was able to watch the whole attack. The cottage was hardly out of musket-range, but nothing would induce her to retire from it. She said she wanted to see a battle, and if Harry sent her to the rear she would return the instant his back was turned. She was excited, and nervous, not for herself but for Harry, and West could not prevail upon her to move away from the window. She kept thinking that she could pick Harry out amongst the mounted officers, and although it was impossible that she could recognize him at such a distance, this conviction very soon put her into a fever of anxiety. The Rifles, dark-habited troops in advance of the red-coats, seemed to be swarming all over the slope of the Bayonette. Spurts of fire from behind bushes and crags of rock showed that they were availing themselves of every bit of natural cover, but the Bayonette looked to be so precipitous that it did not seem possible for any troops to scale it.

‘It’s safer shooting uphill than down,’ said West comfortably. ‘Nor master isn’t with the skirmishers. It’s not likely he would be, in his position.’

‘Oh, he is always in the most dangerous place!’ said Juana, wringing her hands. ‘I wish I had not stayed! This is terrible!’

‘Well, now, missus, do but let me saddle Tiny, and I’ll take you away!’

‘No, no, not for anything in the world! How could I possibly go away?’ she replied, not stirring from the window. ‘I am glad he is riding Old Chap. It is better to be mounted on a good horse, isn’t it, West?”

West assured her that it was half the battle, but she hardly attended to him, crying out suddenly that the Rifles were being thrown back. This brought him to the window, and he saw that what she said was true, the French having rushed out in great numbers from the redoubt on the spur of the hill, and driven the skirmishing line back. They had, in fact, mistaken the Riflemen, in their green uniforms, for a detachment of Caçadores, and were considerably discomposed when they discovered their mistake. For the 52nd had come up behind the Rifles, and as these fell back, Colborne led his regiment forward in a grand charge which carried the first of the redoubts.

From the cottage window, it was hard to see anything but confusion on the hillside. There was a great deal of noise, and the struggle, swaying uphill and down, looked to be such a desperate business that Juana involuntarily covered her eyes. Upon West’s pointing out to her a little knot of persons visible on a hill-crest overlooking the whole, and telling her he could clearly detect Lord Wellington in their midst, she looked up again, childishly hoping that his lordship would send instant help to Harry’s brigade.

She would have been indignant had she known that at that very moment an ADC had galloped up to General Alten with a message from Kempt, a mile away, and out of sight round the flank of the Grande Rhune, to ask if the 52nd regiment could give him some assistance.

‘Colonel Colborne gif him some assistance!’ said Alten. ‘If he could see der hill Colborne’s Prigade is on, he’d see dat Colborne has quite enough to do himself!’ The dropping of men upon the slope of the Bayonette was a sight too heartrending for Juana to bear. She turned away with a shudder, begging West, however, to keep a sharp look-out. He was able, presently, to tell her that the 52nd had reached the first redoubt, and that the Rifles and the Caçadores were fair murdering them Frenchies on their retreat to the top of the ridge.

She ran back to the window, but had scarcely reached it when a chestnut hunter came galloping to the rear, his saddle empty, and his rider, caught by one foot in the stirrup, dragged over the ground beside him.

A shriek of the wildest despair burst from Juana. ‘Old Chap!’ ‘My God it is!’ West muttered.

Juana ran out of the cottage, her desperate fear lending her such speed that West, though he ran as fast as he could, was not able to catch up with her. The dead man, his foot freed from the stirrup, was lying in a heap some distance away, but the chestnut still came on, bolting in terror away from the battle-ground. Colour and marking were the same as Old Chap’s, but as he galloped past her Juana recognized him, and stopped running. West, pounding up behind her, gasped out: ‘Missus, it’s not Old Chap! It’s that Portuguese Colonel’s horse that’s the living spit of master’s!’

She was deathly pale, her chest labouring. She tried to smile, to speak, but the shock had been too much for her, and to West’s dismay she fell at his feet in a deep faint. She did not come round until he had carried her back into the cottage, and laid her on her bed. He was in a great state of anxiety about her, and between splashing water over her, and shouting to Jenny Bates to get some feathers to burn under her nose, seemed in danger of becoming quite distracted. But in a few moments, Juana recovered consciousness, and tried to sit up.

Jenny Bates, elbowing West out of the way, pushed her back on to her pillow. ‘Now, you lie still, missus, do! That’s enough of watching nasty battles! If some people had the sense they was born with, they never would have let you go agaping out of the window!’ ‘Not Old Chap!’ Juana said in a husky voice. ‘I saw. It was poor Algeo! Oh, West, look out and tell me what is happening!’

‘He’ll tell you our men are safe on top of the hill, and no need for any of us to worry our heads over them!’ said Jenny, in such minatory accents that West took the hint, and reported the brigade to be in possession of the heights.

‘Oh, is it true?’ Juana said. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Why, where else would they be?’ demanded Jenny scornfully. ‘You don’t want to fret about master, for he’s enjoying himself, same as my man will be, if I know them! Men! Yes, there’s nothing they like better than to go mixing themselves up in a nasty, bloody battle, fair frightening the wits out of decent women, and themselves like a set of pesky lads out of school! You lie quiet now, and see if master don’t come bounding in presently, as right as a ram’s horn, and telling you what a rare day’s fighting he’s had!’

‘If you are sure it is all over!’ Juana said, with a shudder. ‘But I can still hear firing!’ ‘Ay, but it’s not our men,’ West assured her. ‘Of course it’s all over! I daresay master will be standing there, atop of the hill with the Colonel, at this very moment.’