In Gratitude, In Grief

The Lieutenant was staring at the huge, ornate double doors in a vicious sweat. It had been a pleasantly cool evening in Paris, even with the stifling scarlet uniform he wore, it should have been cold enough to dance without breaking a sweat. Yet… he stared at the lacquered wooden door. It showed, in its ornamentation, two horses rampant. The Lieutenant’s breath heaved in his chest, painful and slow. He couldn’t do this. He went to turn away, unable to face what he had to do. The gentle humming of music sounding his retreat.

He turned and met Captain Drake’s energised blue eyes. “Ah! Lieutenant!” His genial greeting shook the Lieutenant out of the sights and sounds only he could hear. 

“I thought you were with our tender Doctor, not leaving us so soon eh?”

”No sir, I just…”

”Star struck by our great Colonel, the Duke of Wellington?” Drake’s smile betrayed his pleasure at so easily determining the issue plaguing his regiment's newest lieutenant.

“‘Pon my soul that will simply not do, I’ll introduce you” he beamed at the dumbstruck lieutenant, who couldn’t put out any words to protest at the assumption.

Drake put his arm around the still somewhat moist lieutenant and opened the door with his other hand. 

The door was thrown open into a well lit, lavish ballroom. With tapestry lining the stone walls, casting shadows round the edges of the ballroom. The room was filled with men in the uniforms of Europe's armies. British scarlet, Prussian black, Russian green, Austrian white and even French blue speckled the room like a painting. This was all chased by the sheer variety of fashion and colour on display by the women. Cream, grey, green, and blue accented the uniforms of their menfolk. The ornate chandeliers gave the light to the bathed pale powdered faces as well as sun-browned and scarred faces, that topped these colourful outfits. 

Some turned their faces their way, scanning the two to apply any recognition to the blue uniformed cavalrymen. But there was one that caught the lieutenants eye. She was wearing a black dress, with pinned raven black hair, contrasting her powdered white face. Her deep brown eyes locked with his and in that moment, he would have rather fought the snarling cuirassiers in his dreams. For she looked upon the lieutenant, not with hate, not with loathing or disgust, but with a genuine smile. He blinked hard. He nodded as he was paraded past, unable to look away for a second. Giving the look, not of lust for a pretty woman, but as if she had sprouted wings and flown away.

He was sucked out of his slow motion torment by Captain Drake saying his name. 

“My lord, this is Lieutenant Frederick Mercer”

He was suddenly looking at perhaps the most distinguished member of the ball and he couldn’t recall walking the floor to him, such was his trance.

“Ah, I didn’t realise Captain Mercer of G Troop had brothers” the Duke of Wellington asked, in all his purported coldness.

“No your grace, we’re of Middlesex not of Yorkshire”

“Well, you could be a Mercer out of hell, but if you fight like our regiment did at Waterloo, you’ll be fine in my books. Were you there?” 

“Y..yes your grace” Lieutenant Mercer stammered, trying to suppress the memories of hooves and blood that were bleeding into his mind at the mention of the place. 

“Good show my man I-” The Duke abruptly stopped as another guest came through the door. “Will you forgive me gentlemen, I have a prince to greet” The Iron Duke walked past Drake and Mercer, followed by his coterie of aides and sycophants. Talk of a Blücher coming from the Duke could be heard faintly over the polite conversation. This left Drake and Mercer to their own devices.

“Well… that wasn’t so hard was it?” Drake said, slapping the back of Mercer.

“Now, I have a punch bowl calling my name and there will be a woman who shall be calling it by the end of the night” He grinned at Mercer. 

“Though it looks like you’ve got a scent, you old dog you!” Drake had caught Mercer, looking a bit too long at the black dressed woman. 

“Steady on, my good fellow, the night is young and it’d be ill manners to leave too early with a woman, but I won’t stop you if you think patience will be a virtue with this hunt” He slapped Mercer on the back again, and when Mercer looked back, Drake was gone. 

Mercer was still terrified looking at the woman in mourning. She had her back to him and he found his right hand was jittering. The pre-battle shakes that affected some men, yet in this airy ballroom in Paris, it was upon him again. He couldn’t move, even as he tried to take a step towards this black-clad harbinger. 

A flash caught his eye, and he thought he was going to yelp, as a glass pitcher caught the light. But all Mercer saw was the glint of steel-tipped lances and shining breastplates. “Ride them down!” “On to Paris!” as the thunder of hooves swallowed the faint chatter and clatter of feet dancing. The dancers were crushed by sweaty heavy horses crashing into broken infantry and exhausted cavalry. Parry, cut, kill; cut, cut, kill. What Glory! Calls of triumph fuelled his own roar of exultation at breaking Napoleon’s vaunted cuirassiers. He raised his sword, taking up the cry “Onward to Paris!” “Onward to-”

A gentle hand, and voice popped the vision like a boil being lanced.

“Mister Mercer isn’t it?”

She was right in front of him. Her black-lace gloved hand on his arm. Ice slashed at his guts as he stared into concerned brown eyes. Yet, he began sweating again.

“Uh” he gulped.

“Ye…, yes” 

She smiled.

“Coronet Mercer, from the Duchess’ of Richmond's ball?” she inquired.

“Yes, he is I” He smiled weakly. Take a hold of yourself Lieutenant, you are not a child, you are a cavalryman of the best cavalry in the world, act like it.

“Lieutenant now” He put in with more confidence, but behind the confident smile, he was brittle at the reminder of how he got the rank.

“Ah” she laughed slightly.

“I could never get your silly soldiers’ uniforms right”.

Mercer chuckled, not knowing what to say.

“Marcus talked of you fondly” She remarked. Mercer’s already aching lungs couldn’t push out a sound at a mention of that name

The silence stretched out before them both, like a battlefield, becoming awkward.

She looked away as she asked the question that broke Mercer.

“How did he die?” She looked at him after asking with such fierceness he almost took a step back. His mouth worked but sound and voice eluded him.

“They told me he died a hero, but that’s what they all say. What will I tell our son? That he died a hero like every other man who died bleeding at a surgeon's table? That he died a hero, like those that were hacked to offal? That he died a hero, blown to Kingdom Come by a cannon?” Her meek demeanour and coy politeness had vanished, to be replaced with such a vivid and fiery temper, in such a short time made Mercer reel.

“Mrs Fairbank” He protested meekly.

“Don’t you Mrs Fairbank me” She hissed. 

“I’ve spent the last few months being told all the platitudes and all the excuses” Her voice then took a mocking tone.

“Mrs Fairbank, this is most inappropriate” Her voice changed to be slightly higher.

“Oh Mrs Fairbank, we’ve told you! He died a hero!” Her voice shifted to a bad Scottish accent.

“You’ve got a mouth on you young lady, you shouldn’t be talking of such things” She looked him dead in the eyes.

“Well?” Her sudden fury, so well concealed to the other ball-goers, that they had no idea of the blessed, pure rage of a widow that had been unleashed.

“Because if I found out he died like a coward trying to ru-”

“He died a hero!” Mercer forced the words at her like a roundshot. He hadn’t raised his voice over the gentle music, but his force of will drove into her like a sword point. He had taken her tirade, unable to defend himself as she, and the memories of that day, pincered him into inaction. But that last remark had ignited the fury in his heart, the insult of his memory pushed burning oil in his veins.

She stared at him. Both were shocked at the sudden, intense emotion being fired off like Howitzers. She looked away as the same silence that filled the battlefield after an artillery barrage, accompanied them in that ballroom. She turned to look at him again, delicately wiping tears from her face. Suddenly feeling guilty, he opened his mouth to say something, but whatever it was died in his throat as he heard her say:

“He told me too much of war.” Her voice was surprisingly steady as she laid out the words.

“It was my own fault. I was never able to be told no once my curiosity peaked.” a flicker of a smile accompanied her recollection before being drowned in sorrow again.

“All the ways young men die on those fields” her voice cracked for the first time.

“He listed them in great detail, in great anger after I touched a nerve one night.” she sighed before wiping another tear away.

“So… Lieutenant, tell me how he died, I’m begging you” Mercer watched as she clasped her hands in front of her. A single tear made a line through her powdered face, like a roundshot hitting a line of men. Her eyes implored, beseeched, begging him and for the first time he was calm. 

He wasn’t nervous, his hand wasn’t jittering as if he was to charge all over again. He knew his duty. This is what he had come to do. He swallowed his fear, like he did that day. This time, to simply say thank you.

“It was just after the Red Germans had been destroyed” He began his tale with the dead littering his mind, willing him to tell their story. Her aching gaze faded to the small walled farmhouse surrounded by French blue coated demons and Red-Coated corpses.

“The elite of France’s cavalry, the Cuirassiers, had just butchered our men around La Haye Sainte. Lord Uxbridge was ordered to deploy us to sweep them away.” He took a deep breath in and met her eyes.

“I cannot convey to you the joy we felt in that moment. All of us, thundering towards the enemy's elite mounted troops before they could get behind their infantry and get away with their perfidy. Such burning joy took us all, as if the Holy Spirit itself ignited our blood to bright holy flame that beat in our veins. It was like ascending to a higher plane of existence, to be close to the saints and heroes of old for just a moment, to touch what made them glorious.” 

For the first time in months a smile opened his face, revealing a rather handsome and kind hearted man rather than the dour, anxiety ridden wretch he had been since that day. 

“It reached fever pitch as we ploughed into them” He had gripped his dress sword unknowingly in his fitful recollection. ‘What a time to be alive’ I thought! To see the enemy that had subjugated Europe crying for help as we slashed them down. Our hooves driving their dream of Empire into the mud. As what was left of the horsemen fled, the French infantry, caught completely off guard by the retreating cavalry, fell before us. The smell of blood spraying up your arm as a carpenter or farmer judders your blade with his last breaths before oblivion, the sound of broken bones as the men who fell were trampled by our might, that taste as sweet as the fruit the devil gave unto Eve.” So deep in his trance, he did not notice her expression change to horror. But she stayed silent.

“‘On to Paris!’ The cry was. We’d ride every crapaud down between here and Paris! We were Gods of War unbent, unbowed, unbroken, indefatigable!” In that moment his face fell into horror to match the widows’.

“We hadn’t noticed the French lancers had come from their reserves. Just as the cuirassiers, who had reformed whilst we wiped their infantry off the map, counter charged.” A tear began forming in his eyes.

“‘My god,’ I thought, ‘I’m going to die’. The feeling so complete as my companions, my brothers in arms, fell before me. I felt cheated, ‘this isn’t how I die!’ I roared at them, I am a God of War. I parried the first gleaming warrior to reach me and broke his arm with my heavy blade before wheeling and killing another with a blow to the back of his neck as he tried to get past me. I took another's sight forever as he tried to attack something to my left. It was then I noticed Marcus had my bridle and was shouting at me. ‘Run! Fly you stupid whoreson!’ I looked to see the lancers were enveloping us, and so we rode like the devil himself would take us if he caught us. I saw Marcus get clear of the lancers as I felt a force of nature take my horse from under me. My right leg was in such agony I had thought I would lose consciousness as my horse nearly broke my leg. A lance point protruded out of my steeds’ side as I landed badly getting out of my saddle. I tried to stand, I stumbled, adjusted then I toppled as my leg finally betrayed me. I stood again and tried to hobble to the safety of our infantry square, then I felt the devils pitchfork lance his lava into my back. The force had knocked me flat and had pushed my lungs free of air. I pushed my head up to see a horseman thundering toward me, and I would be damned if I would die like this, so I got to my knees and put my blade in guard. I wiped the mud and blood from my face just time to see the horseman thunder past me, and a scream to follow. 

I heard a familiar voice shout my name but I was insensate. When hands tried to grab me from behind, I flailed uselessly. But then I saw the blue cuffs of my regiments uniform and recognised Marcus’ voice. He pushed me up onto his horse. ‘I’m getting you home to your wife like I promised’ he yelled as he tried to ride through a group of four lancers who had now closed the enveloping trap. 

She was in full on tears unbeknownst to Lieutenant Mercer who was also leaking from his eyes, neither making a sound apart from Mercer’s retelling. 

“I couldn’t breathe, until I coughed blood in a painful fit as Marcus thundered at them. He parried one, thrusting at another, with his horse barreling past the parried lance point into the unexpecting lancer’s horse. We all tumbled. I was thrown from the saddle. I must have broken ribs when I landed as I couldn’t force a breath in. It instead came in shuddering agony what felt like an eternity later, as I saw Marcus stand back up. His left arm hung limply by his side, but he had his blade held firm. He was yelling at me to get up if I was alive, we were paces from the infantry, but the lancers, furious at the death and wounding of their comrades, were on us before we could have run.” 

Mercer’s voice cracked for the first time. Feeling ashamed as he tried to stop himself from crying freely. Everytime he opened his mouth to finish his story, it would sputter into silence. The both of them, tears flowing, everyone else dancing unknowingly near the two in grief.

“I… can’t… I” He moaned in anguish. 

“I’ve heard enough,” she squeaked. It was then she hugged him. 

Despite the looks of the older more traditional members of the ball thinking it inappropriate. The two souls slipping under in agony held each other for support so they would not lose themselves to the endless bruise of the soul that sorrow was. 

“He died saving me” He said simply, when the agony abated just for a moment. She held him tighter as the words came out. He didn’t care that his ribs ground together under her gentle pressure.

“Thank you” she whispered as she let go, both of them now feeling a bit awkward and ostensibly being strangers, yet sharing a moment of such intimate existential grief for a good man gone.

“For what?” he finally said, unceremoniously cuffing his tears away. 

“For telling me the truth”

“But he… they even gave me his damned rank… Why would…”

“He always put others before himself,” She whispered.

“He did,” he conceded.

“Besides he died a hero, like you said Lieutenant and as he wanted”

“Better than most men that day. I still see sabres and breastplates when I sleep. The scream of men and horses. The smell of blood… him…” She put her finger on his lips in a surprisingly intimate gesture. 

“Then tonight we will dance all night, so you may have the small relief you have given me and we shall tell stories of him, something to tell his son and your comrades.

They gave each other that brittle smile that people in agony give you, when a brief respite appears and insulates them from that hurt, for just a moment.

“Thank you.” He whispered as they went to join the dancing. To put that hurt on hold, like the heroes they were, for a hero they loved.