Free The Sabre's Edge by Allan Mallinson Page A

Hervey, having lowered his collar and unfastened his cloak, quickly reversed the decision with the first bites at his neck. He was lucky to have his hands free for it, unlike the oarsmen.
    'There's the place,' exclaimed Captain Birch suddenly, double-checking his map. 'It's good and flat, and Kemmendine just around the bend ahead. We land there.'
    Hervey searched with his telescope. It was an excellent place to disembark. Boats could beach and the grenadiers jump to dry land, if that description was at all apt. ' 'Ware pickets, though, Birch. It's altogether too likely a place.'
    'It may be so, Hervey, but we're beggars in choice.' He hailed his ensign in the boat alongside. 'Secure a footing, Kerr!'
    Ensign Kerr, looking half the years of any man in his boat, saluted and put the cutter at once for the shoal.
    'Pull!' bellowed the mate: he would have it run well up the bank.
    Out scrambled the grenadiers as the boat stuck fast, a full ten feet of keel out of the water. At once a fusillade opened on them.
    Musket balls struck the clinker side. A grenadier crumpled clutching his stomach. One dropped to his knees, his hip shot away. Another fell backwards into the water with a ball in his throat.
    'Lie down!' shouted Ensign Kerr.
    They did so willingly, even in so much mud, while Kerr himself stood brazenly looking for the source of the musketry.
    Another volley. White smoke billowed from a thicket not a hundred yards away.
    Bad soldiers, tutted Kerr. No target for the volley and all to lose by giving away the position. The bayonet should dislodge them easy enough!
    But no - his eyes deceived him. It was no haphazard cover in which the musketeers hid, but bamboo walls as before, only this time most artfully, cunningly , concealed. He looked up and down the bank. There was no other place to land to advantage. 'Stand up, men!'
    As soon as fire was opened, Captain Birch had signalled for the other boats to row for the bank, covered from view by abundant mangrove. 'We'll just have to hack through,' he called to Hervey, gesturing at the tangle that overhung the river.
    Both were now standing in the stern trying to get a clearer picture of Kerr's skirmish.
    'Not two dozen muskets by the sound of it,' said Hervey. 'Your man might yet do it on his own.'
    That indeed was Ensign Kerr's intention. 'Fix bayonets! On guard!'
    He would waste no time trying to load - certainly not to have so many of them misfire with damp powder. And the clattering of bayonets locking home was a fine sound!
    'Advance!'
    Captain Birch gasped at the audacity. 'Make after them!' he bellowed. 'Pull hard!'
    They fairly raced through the slack water of the bank, but there wasn't the same room to get the boats run up the shoal.
    'Out! Out!' roared Birch, leaping from the stern into water knee-deep, followed by Hervey and Corporal Wainwright.
    The silting was so bad it took the greatest effort to make the five yards to the bank. 'All right, sir?' asked Wainwright as they crawled out.
    'Ay, just,' said Hervey, sliding back a second time before getting to grips with a firm-rooted clump of rushes to pull himself fr ee of the silt. ‘I’ d forgotten how much easier it is on four legs.'
    Captain Birch was only a stride ahead of them, and Ensign Kerr's picket was half-way to the stockade. 'Come on you grenadiers, form line!' he bellowed.
    But his voice could barely be heard above those of the NCOs, all of whom had the same idea.
    'Right marker! ’ a corporal was screaming, his hand raised.
    A line started to take shape, in double rank -if not as on parade, then no very great distance from it.
    Birch doubled to the front and centre. He would have regularity. 'Company will fix bayonets. Fix . . . bayonets!’
    Hervey, coming up beside him, drew his sabre.
    Behind him came the rattle of a full five dozen blades being rammed home.
    'Company, on guard!'
    Up came the muskets, bayonets thrust out to impale the luckless souls who stood in their way.
    'Company will advance, by the