Evil in a Mask (13 page)

Roger shook his head. ‘No, Sire, Mr. Pitt being dead I had no inclination to serve his inept successors. I returned to the Continent only because I became bored with leading an idle life in England and, having for so long been a man of some note in the French Army with more friends in it than I had in my own country, I decided to rejoin the Emperor's staff. Trafalgar made Britain safe from invasion, so she now stands on the side line of this great conflict. I have never had any love for the Prussians, so had no objection to serving against them, simply for the enjoyment I derive from being actively employed. But, should Britain again be menaced, I would, of course, do anything I could to aid her cause.'

After a moment the Czar said, ‘Mr. Brook, it seems to me that you have failed to face up to realities. I am England's ally. Should my armies be defeated, which St. Nicholas for
fend, Bonaparte will enjoy a clear field to inflict grievous harm upon your country. Although he may no longer be in a position to invade England, he has always had ambitions to become another Alexander the Great in the East. He might well direct his legions against Turkey and Persia, then throw the British out of India and so deprive your country of one of her great sources of wealth. Are you, as you implied the day before yesterday when you broke ranks and cast yourself at my feet, willing to serve me as you served Mr. Pitt, by giving me your help to defeat the French?'

Again Roger bowed. ‘I take your Imperial Majesty's point, and, if you will arrange to have me exchanged for a Russian officer of equivalent rank, I will do my utmost to be of service to you.'

‘Good,' the Czar nodded. ‘Then tomorrow we will talk again.' Picking up a silver hand-bell from his desk, he rang it. Chernicheff, who had been waiting outside, came in and escorted Roger back to the rooms that had been assigned to him. By then it was getting on for one o'clock in the morning. Well satisfied with the way things had gone, Roger got out of his clothes and tumbled into bed.

The following day was Sunday and, after attending service in the big, onion-domed Orthodox Cathedral, the Czar again sent for Roger. This time Alexander had with him Prince Adam Czartoryski and a secretary sitting at a small table, ready to take notes. Prince Adam, although a Pole, was the Czar's principal Minister and closest friend. He had travelled widely, twice made prolonged visits to England, and spoke English fluently.

Alexander was no fool and had evidently decided to make certain that Roger really was an Englishman and not an English-speaking Frenchman who, in fact, was devoted to Napoleon; so the interview opened by Czartoryski's asking him a series of questions about London's leading hostesses and clubs.

Somewhat amused, Roger, as a member of White's, was readily able to convince the Prince that he was well known in London society, and it soon transpired that they had numerous acquaintances in common, including Roger's closest friend,
Lord Edward Fitz-Deveril, known to his intimates as ‘Droopy Ned'.

Fully satisfied, Alexander invited him to sit down and join them in a glass of wine, then began to question him about the French Army. Roger said that, to the best of his belief, it had numbered some seventy-five thousand men, only about half of whom were French; but the day-long conflict at Eylau had been so fierce that he thought it possible that dead, wounded and prisoners might well have reduced its effectives by a third or more.

At that the Czar smiled. ‘We, too, suffered very heavily, but my domains are greater than those of France, Austria and Prussia put together. It takes many weeks for contingents mobilised in distant parts to reach the battle-front; but they are arriving daily. Moreover, I am shortly about to leave for Memel to confer with the King of Prussia, and I have good hopes that between us we will be able to put into the field an army considerably superior to that of the French.'

Roger shook his head. ‘I would not count on it, Sire. Bonaparte's greatest assets are his organising ability and the speed with which he carries out his intentions. You may be certain that, within twelve hours of his having been checked at Eylau, his Chief of Staff was sending scores of couriers to every country now under French control—Poland, Hanover, the Confederation of the Rhine, Holland, Piedmont, Venetia, Dalmatia and Italy, as well as France—demanding the immediate despatch of reinforcements. It would not surprise me if he had not doubled his numbers by the time you engage him in another pitched battle.'

‘Perhaps,' remarked Czartoryski. ‘But most of his troops will be newly-conscripted, and of poor quality. From the conduct of certain regiments at Eylau and the prisoners we took there, it became evident to us that the
Grande Armée
is no longer the formidable force it was at Ulm and Austerlitz.'

‘True, Prince,' Roger agreed. ‘The foreign elements naturally resent having to go to war for the aggrandisement of France, and the French no longer display the
élan
that they did, except when under the eye of the Emperor or there is
easy loot to be had. Most of them long to be done with campaigning, and return to their homes. That applies even to many of the Marshals. They would be only too glad to cease having to risk their lives and, instead, spend their remaining years enjoying their wealth and honours.'

The Czar took a pinch of snuff. ‘They must be a most unusual body of men, and one cannot know too much about the personalities of enemy Generals. Tell me what you know of them.'

Roger smiled. ‘The only thing they have in common, Sire, is their comparative youth, combined with long experience of war. Of those on the active list, if one excepts Berthier, the Emperor's Chief of Staff, and the dull Moncey, who is Chief of the Gendarmerie, their average age is a little over forty. They are a self-opinionated, quarrelsome lot and so bitterly jealous of one another that no lesser man than Napoleon could keep them in order. Masséna is probably the most skilful of them; but when they were created Marshals in 1804 and a friend congratulated him, he exclaimed in disgust, “I see nothing to be pleased about—just one of fourteen.” '

‘I thought he created eighteen,' interjected the Prince.

‘There are, but four of them-—Kellermann, Lefèbvre, Perignon and Sérurier—are only honorary Marshals, given the rank for their services in the Revolutionary wars. The Emperor's policy, as you may know, has been to overcome the antagonism of the most influential Jacobins who resented his making himself a monarch, by elevating them, too. Lannes, Augereau, Jourdan and Bernadotte were all red-hot Republicans, but have since come to heel. The last, although his worst enemy, he made Prince of Ponte Corvo, whereas most of the others he made only Dukes.'

‘Whom would you say was the bravest of them?' asked the Czar.

‘Ney, Lannes and Murat must share that honour, Sire. As a cavalry leader, Murat is incomparable. He leads every major charge himself, in uniforms he has designed, smothered in gold and jewels, and wearing a busby from which sprout white ostrich feathers a foot high.'

‘And the most able?'

‘Masséna, Soult, Mortier and Davoust. When they were created, all the others sneered at Davoust's being included among them; but he has since more than justified it. At Auerstädt, without aid or direction from the Emperor, he won a great victory over an army more than twice the size of his corps, and since, so I have been told, he saved the French from defeat at Eylau. Perhaps I should include Berthier: not as a General, but in his own highly-specialised work. That big head of his is a living card index. He could tell you at any moment where every unit in the Army is, and how long it would take to move it from one place to another. As a Chief of Staff, he is incomparable.'

‘You have not mentioned Bessières or Brune.'

‘Bessières' promotion was also resented by the others, Sire, on account of his youth. But, as Commander of the Imperial Guard, with no disrespect to your own Household troops, he has made his corps probably the most formidable fighting force in Europe. As for Brune, he is a nonentity, and received his baton only because he defeated the English when they sent an expeditionary force to Holland, shortly before Napoleon got back from Egypt. But any bonehead could have outgeneralled a man as stupid as our Duke of York.'

‘What of those who were passed over?' enquired the Prince. ‘From what I have heard, Marmont, Macdonald, Suchet, Victor and Junot seem to have proved just as able as several of the others.'

Roger laughed. ‘The rage they displayed for weeks had to be seen to be believed. Mortier was made virtual Viceroy in Dalmatia, and why he did not get his baton I cannot think. Macdonald, Suchet and Victor also deserved theirs for their fine performances in Italy. But Junot, no. Napoleon realised that he would be hopeless as a corps commander; but he never forgets his old friends, and Junot practically kept him years ago when he had very little money, so he consoled him by making him Military Governor of Paris.'

They talked on for another hour about Napoleon's military campaigns and his ability as an administrator. At length,
the Czar said, ‘Upstart though he may be, I cannot but admire the man for the way in which he has restored France from a state of anarchy to good order, and in his new code of law he has embodied many benefits that I should like to grant to my own people. For obvious reasons, Mr. Brook, I must continue to treat you as a prisoner; but as soon as I can, I will arrange an exhange for you, and I have good hopes that in the months to come you will find means to convey to me information about Napoleon's intentions, that will prove of value.'

‘That will not be easy, Sire,' Roger said thoughtfully. ‘Can you suggest any means by which I might do so?'

It was Adam Czartoryski who replied. ‘You may have been misled by what you have seen of the Polish people. My nation is divided. One half believes the vague promises of Bonaparte that, given their aid to defeat Russia, he will restore Poland's independence. The other half, which includes most of our noble families and intelligentsia, puts no faith in the half-promises of this self-made Emperor, who is known many times to have broken his word. They prefer to place their trust in His Imperial Majesty, who has assured them that, under the protection of Russia, he will grant Poland independent government. It should not be difficult for you to make the acquaintance of a number of Polish officers at present serving with the French; sound them out about their political views and, when you find one or more who are in arms against Russia only with reluctance, persuade them to desert at the first opportunity and bring with them any useful information you may have for us.'

Roger believed that he owed his life to the fact that, except on very few occasions when he had seen no alternative, he had never divulged to anyone that he was a secret agent; so he at once decided against adopting the Prince's suggestion. Nevertheless, he replied:

‘That is certainly an idea worth exploring. But should favourable circumstances arise in which I can, without undue risk of being killed, allow myself to be captured again, that is what I will do; for I could then give you a far more complete
picture of the situation of the French than I could convey through any messenger.'

The interview being over, Alexander extended his hand for Roger to kiss, and he bowed himself out from the Imperial presence, to be again escorted by the waiting Chernicheff back to his quarters.

A fortnight went by, during which time he had three more long talks with Prince Adam about the state of the French Army; but, except for these, he idled his time away reading French books, of which a great number were available in the Palace library.

It was on the morning of the last day in March, that Cherni-cheff greeted him with a cheerful smile and said, ‘Your exchange has been arranged. I have orders to escort you to a village on the Alle, a few miles above Allenstein, and there the exchange will take place.'

This meant a journey of some one hundred and ten miles, but the thaw had set in so, instead of a sleigh, they were able to go in a well-upholstered travelling coach, accompanied by outriders who acted as servants, and with a stock of provisions that were cooked for them whenever they decided to halt and have a meal. In most places the snow was melting fast and pouring away in thick, muddy streams to swell rivers and lakes; in others the remains of great drifts of it still formed solid ice mounds several feet in height, over which the coach had to be manhandled; so it was four days before they reached Allenstein, where they spent the night.

Early on the morning of the fifth, Roger said good-bye to Chernicheff and, at some peril, was ferried across the rushing river Alle, under a flag of truce. Waiting on the far bank was a Russian Colonel, who greeted him warmly. Shaking hands, they congratulated each other on their restoration to freedom; then the Russian boarded the ferry to rejoin his countrymen.

The French officer who received Roger told him that, after remaining in the neighbourhood of Eylau for a week, to establish his claim to victory, the Emperor had withdrawn beyond the river Passarge and the upper Alle, where the Army had since remained in winter quarters. Thorn, right
back on the Vistula, had become the main base of the Army, but its headquarters were at Osterode, only some twenty miles away.

Furnished with a mount and an escort of four Hussars, Roger set out for Osterode, to learn, when he reached the town, that the Emperor was actually some distance away at the Castle of Finckenstein. On arriving there, he found it very different from Znamensk, which had not been much more than an old fortified manor house. Finckenstein was a vast, grim, battlemented pile, large enough to house several hundred people, and the central courtyard was crowded with mounted officers, and orderlies constantly coming and going.

On enquiring for the Duc de Friuli, Roger was glad to learn that his old friend was there. In the days before the Empire, the Due had been simply Colonel Duron, Chief A.D.C. to Bonaparte. Then, when the Court had been formed, he had been made Grand Marshal of the Palace or, when on a campaign,
Maréchal de Camp
; but Napoleon had several times sent him on missions as an Ambassador—a use to which he not infrequently put the more intelligent of his military staff.