Cornwallis had pushed them hard for the last three days, anxious to find Dan Morgan and Harry Burwell. Lord Rawdon had been left in command of Fort Carolina and its garrison. Rushing north to scout for signs of the rebel generals, Tavington and his men were moving fast, and had left behind women, supplies, and indeed almost everything that made a soldier's life bearable. Some of the newer men, the recruits who had been captured in arms for the rebels and had since sworn loyalty to the King, were particularly unhappy, and were not shy about expressing their discontent.
Tavington had not been himself since the day of the skirmish with the Martin boy. The graze along his ribs had been stitched, but the stitches were stretched and painful from long hours in the saddle. The cold and wet combined to further exhaust him. He would never give in to his body. As his first mentor, Captain Sharpe, had told him: "A man can always do more than he thinks he can."
He paid the necessary visit to the surgeon's tent, and Smith came to change his bandages. Tavington pulled up the torn and bloody shirt for him, while Smith chattered soothingly of camp gossip. Bordon was clinging to life after the skirmish, and he and a few other survivors were back at a field hospital. If Bordon improved even a little, he would be carried south to Camden for better care. Polly Featherstone was with him, and giving him every attention. Tavington rewarded Smith with a slight smile. He could well imagine that Polly was determined at all costs to save her new man. He missed Bordon's calm support already. He wondered if the captain would ever be fit for duty again. He had given Bordon's troop to Tom Sandford, who had recently made a daring escape from a rebel jail with two other officers, and had fought his way back to the Legion.
As Smith finished, the tent flap opened, and Tavington was startled to find the Lord General bearing down on him. He had no idea what, if anything, the Lord General knew about Tavington's recent deeds.
Cornwallis seemed no more inimical than usual, as he said abruptly, "We will miss you tomorrow, Colonel."
"Miss, my lord?" For one heart-stopping moment, he thought that Cornwallis meant to relieve him of command.
"Your wound."
Brusquely pushing the surgeon aside, Tavington rose to show his commander that he was no invalid. "It's nothing!" he insisted.
Cornwallis looked at him intently. "I stand on the eve of the greatest victory of my career. Don't fail me."
The implied criticism rankled. Tavington declared, "My efforts, in no small measure, have brought you here."
"I grant you that small measure, despite your failure to deliver the Ghost to me."
Tavington could barely restrain the grimace the words provoked. "Thus far," he allowed.
Cornwallis came closer still and gave him his sternest regard. "I will not tolerate a premature charge born of your eagerness for glory. Wait for my order." The Lord General turned away with a parting shot, "Or you may abandon any hope of Ohio." He walked out of the tent, and Tavington was left to his own thoughts. They were fairly unpleasant. He had plainly failed to win his lordship's favour, and any change there seemed unlikely, no matter how the battle went tomorrow. Only delivering the Ghost bodily before Cornwallis might have an effect.
His shirt stank of sweat and was stiff with dried blood. He couldn't bear to spend another day in it. Once back in his own quarters, he reluctantly pulled out the spare shirt he had brought. It was one of the silk ones Elizabeth had given him for Christmas, and he hated to wear it for the first time on this occasion. He cast away the dirty, rank garment, wincing at the twinge from his wound, and slipped on the fresh one. It was incredibly soft, and slid over his skin like a caress. Elizabeth. He knew it would please her that he was wearing her gift.
Thinking of her, he realised he had made no proper disposal of his effects in case the worst happened. Writing quickly, he directed that the few hundred pounds he had should be hers, along with his horse, his weapons, his watch, and his sundry other possessions. When all was said, there really was not much.
He had gone into battle so many times with no one to care if he lived or died. Somehow, it was worse knowing that now hearts would break if he fell. He wondered how married men, men with children, could do this at all. Unbidden, he remembered Elizabeth quoting Martin's words, "I'm a parent. I can't afford principles." He had scorned them before, but he understood them at last.
It did not matter, now. He would sleep. The morning would come, and he would fight. That was his life; until fate and his own devising could provide him with a better.
The field was a rolling one, good for cavalry. Tavington eyed the ground with satisfaction. The Dragoons were another story. Some of them looked as weary as he felt, and the Legion infantry looked worse. Tavington briefly conferred with Major Cochrane, the Legion's infantry commander. Charles Cochrane looked ill himself, and responded glumly to Tavington's queries. Tavington understood: he too had reservations about engaging the rebels now. He comprehended that Cornwallis wanted to smash this force before it could join with Greene, but he could not but feel the British Army was not at its best at the moment. Someone, he thought Wilkins, had told him that they were near a place called Hannah's Cow Pens. Amusing really, going into battle in a backwoods place so primitive there was not even a town nearby to give the battlefield a proper name.
The rebels had formed in line, raggedly enough, and Tavington saw with disbelief the militia in the forefront. Incredible! They are putting their worst troops foremost!
The advance had begun: the rebels came toward them with a show of defiance. When in range they fired a volley. Effective enough—while they lacked discipline, Tavington had never despised them as marksmen. Whether the militia would stand up to a return volley was another question.
The return volley roared forth from the infantry below him. The rebels were falling and beginning to falter. Tavington took a look through his telescope, and saw Benjamin Martin, the Ghost who had haunted him for so many weary months, attempting to rally the militia. They were cracking, as fire raked them and cannonballs removed limbs.
Forgetting the Lord General, forgetting his orders, forgetting everything but his enemy before him, Tavington unsheathed his sword, and shouted, "Prepare to charge!"
"Sir!" Wilkins protested urgently, 'We haven't been given that order!"
Ignoring him, Tavington commanded, "Charge!" Putting his spurs to his mount, not even looking to see if anyone would follow, he galloped down the hill to find the man he hated.
The rebels were retreating. The sight of the infantry marching inexorably towards them, and then Dragoons charging their way, had plainly broken their nerve.
Tavington saw that Cornwallis must have ordered a bayonet charge, for the infantry was trying to race the cavalry to the enemy, like rivals for a fair woman's favour. There was a low rise. Galloping up it, Tavington heard the hoofbeats of the Dragoons closest to him. Up, up, and then he looked down—
And saw Dan Morgan's regulars, neatly arrayed below. In an instant, he knew both he and Cornwallis had fallen into a most elegant trap. Morgan had taken the events that lost the rebels Camden, and had turned them on their head, using the militia's retreat to lure the British in.
"Hold the charge!" Tavington shouted. Most of his men listened. As a rule, there was nothing harder than stopping a cavalry charge once it was well and truly launched, but his men were so exhausted that they were not as swept away by the charge as they might otherwise have been. Some were forging blindly ahead. The opposing infantries were meeting in a bayonet rush; and Tavington was about to rally the Dragoons, when he heard a hated voice in the distance.
"Hold the line!"
There he was, the Ghost, waving his flag and turning the tide of the militia rout. Tavington was hacking at the rebels around him, but theirs was not the blood he wanted. Taking the life of this one man would resolve a world of difficulties and disappointments. Kicking Xanthus forward, he charged down toward Martin, and saw the man looking his way, holding his flag like a lance. Tavington, caught up in the fierce joy of battle, did not recognise his danger until too late.
He was aware of a sudden shock, and Xanthus' shrill death scream; and then he pitched through the air, falling endlessly. He was stunned and disoriented by the impact with the ground, but too engrossed in finding his enemy to yet be much aware of the intense pain in his side, where the stitches had ripped open, and in his hip and thigh, bruised from the fall. He got to his feet, sword still in hand, and surveyed the chaos around him. Where was Martin?
There! Not twenty feet away, drawing aim on him with a pistol. Tavington stared him down, wondering if this would be the end, when an artillery round behind Martin spoiled his aim, and the pistol ball tore through Tavington's left arm. If it had hit the bone, it would hurt more, thought Tavington stoically.
Then he hefted his blade and ran at Martin; and his enemy clubbed his pistol, drew the infamous axe from his belt, and ran towards him. And then there was nothing but the here and now of combat.
Their weapons clashed together in the ancient dance of thrust, slash, and parry. Within seconds, Tavington realised he was at last fighting someone very like himself—a man who gave himself up to combat unreservedly, and who knew all the ways of battle. The man must be a few years older than he, but he was as practised as Tavington, less weary, unwounded, and had not just fallen from a horse.
Nonetheless, Tavington managed to hit him in the face with his sword hilt, and then slashed him across the arm. As Martin staggered, dropping his pistol, Tavington picked up a knife in his left hand, ignoring the pain in his upper arm. They locked blades again. Martin slammed his head against Tavington's, momentarily stunning him, and slashing him across the breast with the newly drawn belt knife in his left hand.
Tavington disengaged to sabre distance, seeking an opening. At last his blade tore open his enemy's back, and Martin's face twisted in agony. Not losing a moment, for this was a man to beware of, Tavington knocked the axe from his hand, and slashed at him again and again.
Martin had snatched up a musket and bayonet from the ground, and used it to block Tavington's sword. He was weakening, he was tiring—Tavington could feel it. Tavington slashed him again, and Martin fell to his knees.
"Kill me before the war is over, will you?" Tavington taunted him. "It appears you are not the better man." He was behind him, readying his blade for the beheading stroke. The pain from his torn stitches slowed him down; and as he swung his sabre, Martin rolled beneath it, stabbing up with the bayonet into Tavington's right side, scraping against a rib.
Shocked beyond belief, Tavington could only stare at the weapon penetrating him.
"You're right," Martin agreed, picking up a bayonet from a fire on the ground. "My sons were better men." Looking into Tavington's eyes, he aimed the hot point right under Tavington's collarbone, and thrust deep. The pain was overwhelming, and Tavington lost sense and coherence to it. Blood was in his mouth, and he was aware that Martin had pulled the bayonet free and had turned away from him.
He was swooning away. The pain in his side and in his upper shoulder reminded him of something—a dream, that was it. Or was this a dream? A wolf and a wild hog tore at him. He could not die! Not like this! Elizabeth needed him. He had promised Julia not to let the rebels kill him. Was his word worth nothing? Blackness came over his eyes, and he drifted in and out of his body.
Occasionally awareness came in flashes. His existence had narrowed down to nothing more than the consciousness of pain. He had fallen to one side and could hear voices from time to time. He longed for water and to clear his mouth of blood. Suddenly he felt himself being moved, being lifted, and tried vainly to scream. Voices around him murmured, but he could make nothing of them. Tavington wondered if the wolves and hogs would come after him again. Something was being wrapped around his wounds, and he tried to stop the torture, but was too weak even to move his uninjured arm.
He drifted away once more, and somewhat later realised that someone was leaning close to him, speaking to him, and he tried to see who it was.
Wilkins' big, stupidly handsome face was over his, peering at him anxiously. "Are you still with me, Colonel?"
Tavington could only manage a weak groan, but it seemed to satisfy Wilkins. "All right then. We're going to get you into the wagon."
He opened his eyes and knew he must be in a field hospital somewhere. He was not dead yet! The pain was so terrible that he was not sure living was worth it, but he must try to survive. He could not die and leave Elizabeth. He had sisters again, and responsibilities. He would not die, if only to spite General Lord Cornwallis.
A surgeon's assistant saw him awake, and called for his superior. Ned Smith ran over, all smiles. "Colonel! Rob, get the Colonel some water."
Water. He would kill for water. He would like to be able to kill for water. We don't appreciate water as we ought, he thought, as the cool blessed stuff filled his mouth. He could taste the blood mixed with it, and grimaced, but then there was just the water and he drank greedily. The movement of swallowing hurt his upper chest wound horribly, and he could not repress a whimper. Smith gave him a few drops of laudanum, and he sank into a relieved torpor.
The next time he awakened, he was still in dreadful pain, but was slightly more rational. He tried to move his left arm, and could not: it was bandaged stationary and he remembered the gunshot wound. He tried to move his right arm, and discovered he could bear to move it, but only from the elbow down. Still, that was enough to feel his bandaged body, and to discover strange-smelling lumps under the wrappings. Poultices of some kind, he supposed. With a certain dread, he began to explore the extent of the damage.
He remembered, unwillingly, the horror of the bayonet stabbing him, and his hand on his waist found the hurt place. Not a belly wound, but too close. He paused a moment, to steady his breathing. There is nothing I can do. I will live or I will die.
He could not reach the damage around his collarbone, but it was extremely painful, and must be serious. But he missed the artery, or I would be dead already. And if he had hit the lung, I would be having more trouble breathing.
There was the possibility of the slow, rotting death from gangrene. Of all the ways to die, Tavington most feared blood poisoning. He had always had clean healing flesh, but he had never before been wounded so badly.
Rob Fraser, the surgeon's assistant, came by again, fed him some lukewarm broth and cleaned him a little. Supposedly Smith would see him soon, to change his bandages and give him more laudanum. Tavington hated the idea of the drug, the very drug that had enslaved and killed his mother, but there was no real alternative. Too much pain could kill a man as dead as loss of blood. He shivered, and Fraser put another blanket over him.
He wondered idly about the outcome of the battle. Possibly things had not gone very well, but the laudanum made the concerns seem very far away. He slept.
Time ceased to have meaning. Occasionally, he was shocked awake as his bandages were changed. He would look down at his body, wounds black and red and oozing, and was rather impressed at the amount of damage he had survived. He had seen men survive worse, he reminded himself. If the wounds did not mortify, he might live and recover.
Smith talked to him quietly as he worked, easing the fouled bandages off, replacing the poultices, and covering him again. He gave Tavington a brief account of how he had come to be here. James Wilkins had rescued him from the battlefield, standing over him and fighting off the rebels until he could put him over a horse, mount up himself, and escape. Wilkins had found a barn to hide in to evade the rebel pursuit, and had eventually made his way back to the British lines. His crude attempt at bandaging Tavington had apparently saved his Colonel's life.
Smith went on, detailing Tavington's condition, "Your arm is healing well—the bullet came out easily, and the wound should cause no trouble in the future. The cut across your chest is stitched up and half-healed already. I know the upper chest wound hurts, sir, but it's doing far better than I could have expected—no sign of infection at all. It's almost as if it was cauterized when it was made."
Tavington forced himself to respond. "The bayonet had been in a fire. I remember it was hot."
"Well, that explains it," said Smith cheerfully. More soberly, he continued, "The old graze in your side was badly torn, but it will heal in time. The other side is a deep wound, but we cleaned it very thoroughly when you were unconscious. I must say I'm glad you took my advice about wearing silk, sir. It came out of you neat as you please."
"How nice," Tavington murmured drowsily. On the edge of sleep, his mind wandered. I wonder if Elizabeth will be happy to know that my shirt came out of me neat as you please?
One evening, Wilkins was dozing in a chair at his bedside when Tavington awakened. The captain looked hollow-eyed and exhausted, and Tavington felt any news he had must be grim indeed. He looked at him for awhile, and then decided knowing was better than not knowing.
"Captain Wilkins," he whispered. Wilkins' eyes opened wide, and he appeared confused for a moment. Seeing Tavington awake, he grinned broadly.
"Colonel, sir! This is wonderful! We all thought we'd lost you!"
"No such luck. How are the Dragoons?"
Gradually, he got the whole story from Wilkins. Halting the charge had kept the Dragoons largely intact. They were alive to fight another day. The battle was lost, and the infantry casualties had been heavy. Reluctantly, Wilkins informed him of the fate of the Legion infantry.
"Sir, you know those recruits we took in after Camden—the ones who wouldn't stand and fight for the rebels?"
Tavington waited.
"Well, colonel, they wouldn't stand and fight for us either. During the bayonet charge, they changed sides and joined the rebels again! Who'd believe such a thing? I reckon though, that they're no loss: the rebels won't get any more use out of them this time than they did before.'
Tavington sighed. Losing the new recruits would decimate the Legion infantry. Furthermore, losing the recruits in such a way would deal the infantry a terrible blow to its morale.
"What of the Lord General?"
"Fit to be tied." Seeing Tavington's blank look, he translated. "Pretty angry, sir. I can't say he didn't have some hard words for you. But there's plenty of blame to go around. If he hadn't pushed us too hard, or sent in the infantry too early, it might have all been different, so there's no talk about court martial, or anything like that, if that's what's worrying you. In fact, the Lord General's beginning to see that he'd have a hard time replacing you."
Tavington huffed a faint laugh. It hurt. He looked at Wilkins' guileless face. "Captain, it appears that I owe you my life. Let me express my deepest gratitude."
"Think nothing of it, Colonel," Wilkins beamed. "I was bound to look after you. You know that picture of Aunt Sarah Jane Minerva's? Well, before we left to go north, she pulled me over to look at it, and she said 'You'll look worse than that, if anything happens to Colonel Tavington. He's Lizzie's last chance at life, and don't you forget it.'" He offered Tavington some water, which was accepted gratefully. "Besides, Colonel, like I said before, a man's got to stand by his kin."
Wilkins sat there, brave and softhearted, honest and loyal; and Tavington was ashamed of himself for having despised him. So, too, the Lord General must have despised me as a mere tool for his use.
Wilkins went on, "As soon as you're a little better, Smith says they'll send you down to Camden to the fort hospital. I was thinking that maybe you'd rather stay at the house, though. Aunt Sarah Jane Minerva sure thinks a lot of you, and Lizzie would want to nurse you herself. What do you think?"
Tavington swallowed, and managed, "I think that sounds perfect."
Author's notes: It is difficult to balance fact and fiction fairly when history and The Patriot are so widely at variance, so I have felt able to make some choices for myself in this chapter. I am indebted to the recent book about Cowpens, Lawrence Babbits' A Devil of a Whipping, for information about the weather and relative condition of the troops at the battle. The battle in the film is not much like the real Cowpens. It is set in the wrong month, and has Cornwallis in command. I have no idea what the picturesque ruins in the middle of the battlefield are meant to represent. On the plus side, the tactic, attributed to Martin in the film, but really the inspiration of Morgan, of using the militia to lure the British in and then using the regulars to flank them is factual. So too, is the deceptively rolling ground that hid the balance of Morgan's forces. For purposes of my story, I have elected to keep Cornwallis, but to use the correct date of the action (January 17, 1781). The incident I mention about the rebel turncoats changing sides yet again is true. Banastre Tarleton received no severe wounds at Cowpens, and thus, I felt it not only my right, but my duty to preserve the life of his fictional counterpart, William Tavington. Flame me all you like: I care not. Tavington lives!
Surgeon Smith and surgeon's assistant Rob Fraser were real; as, by the way, is every British Legion officer I mention by name in this story, with the exception of Bordon, Wilkins, and Tavington himself (the film makers' creations), and David McKay, who is my own invention.
A moment for historical fiction fantasizing: The Captain Sharpe Tavington refers to as his first mentor is not the Richard Sharpe whose adventures have been recounted by Bernard Cornwell. Tavington's former superior, Thomas Sharpe, was a great-uncle of Rebecca, Lady Crawley, whose story was told by Thackeray in Vanity Fair. By a fantastic coincidence, Cornwell's Sharpe bears the same last name—fantastic because Richard Sharpe was actually Tavington's son, begotten on the eve of Tavington's departure for the colonies on a betrayed governess-turned-prostitute named Isabella Sharpe. Though the actor portraying Sharpe in the television productions, Sean Bean, does not resemble Tavington, a look at the actual books will reveal the likeness (dark hair, light eyes, good with a cavalry sabre despite the fact that Sharpe is an infantryman). Tavington would have been proud of Sharpe's accomplishments, but not of his poor horsemanship.
My thanks to my loyal reviewers: Zubeneschamali, Foodie, Tara Rose, Slytherin Dragoon, Ladymarytavington, JaneyQ, Anchovyeater, VivienneTavington, angelfish, uptosomething, Lintasare; oh, and yes, myself, when in a particularly weird and sulky mood. I was very cheered by the good responses I received to Chapter Sixteen, which was painful to write. I hope you will continue to enjoy the story, and find interesting the direction I will take in future chapters.