Corporal Sam and Other Stories. Arthur Quiller-Couch
stout indeed and solid and twenty-seven feet high, with two flanking towers for enfilading fire, besides a demi-bastion at the Mount Orgullo end, yet offering the weak spot in the defences.
The British batteries had found and were hammering at it; not the guns upon Mount Olia, which had been hauled thither to dominate those of the citadel, but a dozen 24-pounders disposed, with a line of mortars behind them, on the lower slope above the estuary, where an out-cropping ridge of rock gave firm ground among the sand-dunes. The undulating line of these dunes hid this, the true breaching battery, from view of Sergeant Wilkes and his men, though they had halted within a hundred yards of it, and for at least an hour the guns had been given a rest. Only, at long intervals, one or other of the mortars threw a bomb to clear the breach—already close upon a hundred feet wide—driven between the two flanking towers. It was behind this breach that the town blazed. The smoke, carried down the estuary by the land-breeze, rolled heavily across the middle slopes of Mount Orgullo. But above it the small castle stood up clearly, silhouetted against the western light, and from time to time one of its guns answered the fire from Mount Olia. Save for this and the sound of falling timbers in the town, San Sebastian kept silence.
'Wonder what it feels like?'
Sergeant Wilkes, not catching the meaning of this, turned about slowly. The speaker was a tall young corporal, Sam Vicary by name and by birth a Somerset lad—a curly haired, broad-shouldered fellow with a simple engaging smile. He had come out with one of the later drafts, and nobody knew the cause of his enlisting, but it was supposed to be some poaching trouble at home. At all events, the recruiting sergeant had picked up a bargain in him, for, let alone his stature—and the Royals as a regiment prided themselves on their inches—he was easily the best marksman in B Company. Sergeant Wilkes, on whose recommendation he had been given his corporal's stripe, the day after Vittoria, looked on him as the hopefullest of his youngsters.
'Feels like?' echoed the sergeant, following the young man's gaze and observing that it rested on the great breach. 'Oh! 'tis the assault you mean? Well, it feels pretty much like any other part of the business, only your blood's up, and you don't have to keep yourself warm, waiting for the guns to tire. When we stormed the San Vincenty, now, at Badajoz—'
Some one interrupted, with a serio-comic groan.
'You've started him now, Sam Vicary! Johnny-raws of the Third Battalion, your kind attention, pray, for Daddy Wilkes and the good old days when pipeclay was pipeclay. Don't be afraid, for though he took that first class fortress single-handed, you may sit upon his knee, and he'll tell you all about it.'
'It's children you are, anyway,' said the sergeant, with a tolerant smile. 'But I'll forgive ye, when the time comes, if ye'll do the Royals credit—and, what's more, I'll never cast up that 'twas but a third battalion against a third-class place. Nor will I need to,' he added, after a pause, 'if the general makes a throw for yon breach before clearing the hornwork.'
'I wasn't thinkin' of the assault,' explained the young corporal, simply, 'but of the women and children. It must be hell for them, this waitin'.'
The same voice that had mocked the sergeant put up a ribald guffaw.
'Didn't the general give warning,' it asked, 'when he summoned the garrison? "I've got Sam Vicary here along with me," he said, "and so I give you notice, for Sam's a terror when he starts to work."'
'If you fellows could quit foolin' a moment—' began Corporal Sam, with an ingenuous blush. But here on a sudden the slope below them opened with a roar as the breaching battery—gun after gun—renewed its fire on the sea-wall. Amid the din, and while the earth shook underfoot, the sergeant was the first to recover himself.
'Another breach!' he shouted between the explosions, putting up both hands like a pair of spectacles and peering through the smoke. 'See there—to the left; and that accounts for their quiet this last hour.' He watched the impact of the shot for a minute or so, and shook his head. 'They'd do better to clear the horn work. At Badajoz, now—'
But here he checked himself in time, and fortunately no one had heard him. The men moved on and struck into the rutted track leading from the batteries to camp. He turned and followed them in a brown study. Ever since Badajoz, siege operations had been Sergeant Wilkes's foible. His youngsters played upon it, drawing him into discussions over the camp-fire, and winking one to another as he expounded and illustrated, using bits of stick to represent parallels, traverses, rampart and glacis, scarp and counterscarp. But he had mastered something of the theory, after his lights, and our batteries' neglect of the hornwork struck him as unscientific.
As he pursued the path, a few dozen yards in rear of his comrades, at a turn where it doubled a sharp corner he saw their hands go up to the salute, and with this slight warning came upon two of his own officers—Major Frazer and Captain Archimbeau—perched on a knoll to the left, and attentively studying the artillery practice through their glasses. The captain (who, by the way, commanded B Company) signed to him to halt, and climbed down to him while the fatigue party trudged on. Major Frazer followed, closing his field telescope as he descended.
'What do you say to it?' asked Captain Archimbeau, with a jerk of his hand towards the great breach.
'It can be done, sir,' Sergeant Wilkes answered. 'Leastways, it ought to be done. But with submission, sir, 'twill be at wicked waste, unless they first clear the hornwork.'
'They can keep it pretty well swept while we assault. The fact is,' said Major Frazer, a tall Scotsman, speaking in his slow Scots way, 'we assault it early to-morrow, and the general has asked me to find volunteers.'
'For the forlorn hope, sir?' The sergeant flushed a little, over the compliment paid to the Royals.
Major Frazer nodded. 'There's no need to make it common knowledge just yet. I am allowed to pick my men, but I have no wish to spend the night in choosing between volunteers. You understand?'
'Yes, sir. You will get a plenty without travelling outside the regiment.'
'Captain Archimbeau goes with us; and we thought, Wilkes, of asking you to join the party.'
'You are very good, sir.' There was hesitation, though, in the sergeant's manner, and Major Frazer perceived it.
'You understand,' he said coldly, 'that there is no obligation.
I wouldn't press a man for this kind of service, even if I could.'
The sergeant flushed. 'I was thinkin' of the regiment, sir,' he answered, and turned to his captain. 'We shall have our men supportin'?—if I may make bold to ask.'
'The Royals are to show the way at the great breach, with the 9th in support. The 38th tackle the smaller breach. To make surer (as he says), the general has a mind to strengthen us up in the centre with a picked detachment of the whole division.'
Sergeant Wilkes shook his head. 'I am sorry for that, sir. 'Tisn't for me to teach the general; but I misdoubt all mixin' up of regiments. What the Royals can do they can best do by themselves.'
'Hurts your pride a bit, eh, sergeant?' asked the major, with a short laugh. 'And yet, my friend, it was only yesterday I overheard you telling your company they weren't fit to carry the slops of the Fifth division.'
'It does 'em good, sir. A man, if he wants to do good, must say a trifle more than he means, at times.'
'You can trust 'em, then?'
'And that again, sir—savin' your presence—would be sayin' more than I mean. For the lads, sir, are young lads, though willing enough; and young lads need to be nursed, however willing. As between you and me, sir'—here he appealed to Captain Archimbeau—'B Company is the steadiest in the battalion. But if the major takes away its captain, and upon top of him its senior sergeant—well, beggin' your pardon, a compliment's a compliment, but it may be bought too dear.'
'Wilkes is right,' said the major, after a pause. 'To take the both of you would be risky; and unless I'm mistaken, Archimbeau, he thinks you will be the easier spared.'
'I haven't a doubt he does,' agreed Captain